I was enchanted with it, and particularly its narrator, right from the start. The character in question, Don Tillman, is for the most part a happy man. He has a satisfying research career, a tenure-track position at the local university, a life organised for maximum efficiency and predictability, and two friends; his colleague Gene whose goal in life is to sleep with a woman from every country in the world, and Gene's wife, Claudia, who also serves as Don's unofficial counsellor. The one thing he lacks is a life-partner and freely admits he has serious deficiencies in the area of romance.
After yet another date founders (the woman in question insists that apricot and mango ice-cream taste completely different but refuses to take part in an experiment to test her hypothesis), he decides to approach the problem scientifically, and with Gene and Claudia's help, he puts together a 16-page questionnaire with which to screen women for their potential suitability as a long-term mate. Having posted the test online, he is just about to embark on The Wife Project in earnest when Rosie Jarmen arrives at his office door.
She wants to find her biological father, but all she knows about him is that she was conceived at a graduation party for her mother's medical class, and needs Don's help to DNA-test the attendees. Despite the fact that Rosie is most definitely not marriage material - she smokes, drinks, doesn't eat meat and thinks ice-cream has distinct flavours - and that her request will seriously interfere with his other work, Don soon becomes completely immersed in the Father Project and finds himself in increasingly strange situations as they attempt to get samples to test. Although he discovers unexpected benefits, including a potential new career as a cocktail waiter, Don is at a loss to explain why he continues to act in such an illogical fashion. There's just something about Rosie.
In many ways this is a standard comic romance, and handled badly Don's lack of insight could easily be tiresome or frustrating (although it is never stated explicitly, it is clear he has Asperger's), but his child-like naivety is part of what makes him such a charming character. Similarly, the plot may be familiar but its twists and turns are themselves wonderfully absurd, and getting a male perspective on classic chick-lit territory does a lot to redeem a genre I usually have little time for.
As is obvious from the afterword, Simsion has put a lot of time and effort into this tale, and it has gone through many iterations as both short story and play before settling into its final form. With its sympathetic portrayal of a character on the autism spectrum and its widespread acclaim as an exceptional debut, The Rosie Project reminded me in many ways of Mark Haddon's novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. It is certainly every bit as good.
• Cushla McKinney is a Dunedin scientist.
