Much as I love almost every kind and form of book for children, there are certain genres that leave me cold. One of these is books about football. I have a theory - which I'm sure many Times readers will disprove - that people who love reading hate team sports, and that the attempt to get football fanatics into reading via stories about footballers is therefore doomed. At least, that's what I thought until I read Mal Peet.

Keeper, Peet's first book featuring the investigative Brazilian journalist Paul Faustino, was a weird blend of football, magic and extraordinary writing that didn't quite come off but signalled a prodigious new talent, justly rewarded with prizes. The second, The Penalty, was even crazier, throwing Brazil's history of slavery into the mix. The third, Exposure, is a retelling of the plot of Othello, and it is totally electrifying. You don't have to care about football (though Peet's descriptions of what it feels like almost converted me) because he makes you care so much about his characters. Clever, funny, moving and superbly well written, it's the work of a major author.

Its black hero, Otello, is a footballer from the impoverished north of Brazil. (“What do you call a Northerner with a roof over his head? A burglar!”) Signed for 50 million to the Espirito club by a rich, snobbish businessman, Otello meets his voluptuously beautiful, white, pop-star daughter, Desmerelda, and is doomed. The attraction is instant, and when she seduces him it's the beginning of a tragic spiral. As in the play, their marriage is doomed because of endemic racism and the plotting of Otello's treacherous manager, Diego; however, Peet throws in two extra ingredients: the modern obsession with celebrity, and Brazil's underclass.

Reworking Shakespeare's plots looks easy, because the archetypes remain immortal, yet they present many pitfalls. How far can you tease, challenge or instruct a reader? Peet intertwines the tale of his star-crossed lovers with a far more harrowing one concerning the life of three children surviving in the notorious favelas. Familiar to those who saw the film City of God, these children survive in an almost unimaginable poverty that has been swiftly colonised by writers as diverse as Anthony Horowitz and Josh Doder.

But it is Peet who describes their existence with most insight and compassion. Bush is responsible both for sensible Felicia, and for his pretty, silly young sister Bianca, whose looks are bringing her into increasing danger as she becomes a young woman.

So harrowing and gripping are the slum parts of Exposure's plot that it's hard to feel an equal sympathy for its rich, kind but stupid hero and heroine. Faustino (as carefully named as all Peet's characters) is the link between both worlds because Bush the dreadlocked beggar boy runs small errands for him, and trusts him; it is Faustino who is present when Otello and Desmerelda meet at a lavish party, who observes, interviews and reports but can't save him from evil. The opposite of Tintin, he is one of the most grown-up characters to appear in crossover fiction for some time.

The ending is not quite like that of the play, and some will find it weaker in its avoidance of total tragedy. The loss of a sporting career can't be as harrowing as the noble Othello's destruction; football is indeed a gentleman's game played by thugs. However, in a week that has seen extraordinary things happen for a black man in the US, the conclusion to Exposure is perhaps more timely, as well as more touching

Exposure by Mal Peet
Walker, £7.99; 448 Buy the book

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