The Demolished Man, by Alfred Bester was published in 1951 and was the first Hugo award winner. It's about a murderer on the run from a police force made up of telepaths, and hits the ground running from the start and doesn't let up until the bitter end. It's the most realistic depiction of telepathic powers that I've encountered, and the tension in the chase runs high for the entire length of the book. Bester gets pretty avant-garde with the typefaces and text layout in places, like where the telepath has to search through the minds of people in a crowd, yet is skilled at making the jumbled thoughts interestingly confusing, and creates the experience for the reader in a clever way that really works. Good stuff.
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