There's a book called Slow Horses by Mick Herron and in the first few pages there's a bit where a man pretends to look at his mobile phone. The author then points out that this is entirely indistinguishable from someone actually looking at their mobile phone. Now, I don't know if Mick Herron observed this, read it somewhere, or heard it and none of those things matter. What matters is he chose to use that phrase in that place in that book and the minute I read it I knew I was reading something brilliant, because it was simple, truthful and illustrated so much about what was to come.

In Tade Thompson's Rosewater there's a passage in the first few pages where Tade points out that, when people matchmake, they are introducing you to someone who they think their version of you will like, and that it is a form of judgement. This gave me exactly the same feeling as reading Herron's book.

Sometimes, there's something about a book where you just know the author has aced it: the voice, the world, the way it all works together and Rosewater rolls. It turns in on itself and grows and drags you forward to the next page. I haven't even finished this book but I want to tell you about it and I want you to read it. I mean, to be fair, you'll probably hear about it anyway but I want to feel like I told you about it right at the beginning and then it can be our secret and we can say we heard of it at the start before everyone else.

In full disclosure I should point out Tade is a friend of mine, and I'm kind of very glad about it. Because he's Tade who wrote Rosewater. If he wasn't my friend he would be Tade Thompson the Author of Rosewater and I think that might make him a bit intimidating on first meeting.

In short, you should buy this book. It is very, very good.