Rosewater

Kaaro works for a secret Nigerian intelligence unit, reading minds through a shared psychic network called the xenosphere. He lives in Rosewater, a town that grew up around an alien biodome, drawing the sick, the desperate and the merely curious with promises of healing.

When people who share his abilities start dying without explanation, Kaaro is ordered to find out why. The work forces him back into a criminal past he would rather leave buried.

The novel moves between three time periods: an alien arrival in London in 2012, Kaaro's recruitment and training in the 2050s, and the investigation itself in 2066. It is science fiction grounded in Nigeria rather than a Western capital, told through Kaaro's guarded, cynical narration. It takes its time, building the xenosphere's workings and the dome's history alongside the present-day case.

Rosewater is the first novel in the Wormwood Trilogy. It won the Arthur C. Clarke Award for best science fiction novel.