Last Updated on August 14, 2018 by
My mystery novel Death By Probability by Urno Barthel (my fiction-writing pen name) has been published! In it, the peaceful life of a research scientist is disrupted by terror and murder. The mystery novel is currently available in five formats – click on any of the following for more information:
Paperback from Barnes and Noble
Kindle e-book from Amazon (features Look Inside sample)
Nook e-book from Barnes and Noble (features Read Instantly sample)
iBook edition from Apple — also available if you open iTunes, go to the iTunes Store and search “Urno Barthel”
PDF e-book from Outskirts Press
I hope you enjoy this mystery novel! And please tell your friends who might like it as well.
Back Cover Description: It caused a hell of a fuss when they found Willard in his office, bloody, splayed out on the floor, chair overturned. Evan Olsson is stunned. Inside a top-secret lab, behind layers of security, his mentor is suddenly and violently dead. Even worse, a mysterious message hints of a deadly plot that threatens the US electrical network. How can Evan deal with all this when he’s got problems of his own? His love life stinks, and his closest friend is a computer program barely smart enough to say “hello.”
Evan takes over the mentor’s project and with a reluctant FBI partner uses computer science and nanotechnology to unravel the mystery. With his personal safety at risk he tracks the mastermind to the Malibu area, but the criminals up the stakes by paralyzing a regional energy network, accelerating their plans for a devastating national attack just days away. Nature disrupts everything with a disaster that helps Evan unmask the criminals but requires him to flee for his life.
Death By Probability pursues a mysterious death to its ultimate secret. Technology and fringe science, friendship and romance, computer intelligence and human frailty — all these help solve a mystery that builds to a fast-paced climax.
About the Author: Urno Barthel is the pen name of Art Chester, a physicist turned technology manager turned writer. His characters are based on real scientists whose quiet lives are disrupted by terror and murder. Art invites you to his website http://artchester.net, which offers commentary about science in our lives, and fiction about scientists. After many years in Malibu, California, Art now spends his time in Michigan, New York state and Hawaii.
This mystery novel was fun to write and is supposed to be even more fun to read! If you don’t like it, please tell me why, and the sequel will be better! And if you like it, please post a review at your favorite bookseller.
Credit: Cover Photo © 2014 JupiterImages Corporation. All rights reserved – used with permission.
Art,,
I have the book on my IPad, and maybe I’ll be the first to take it through the Panama Canal.
Jim
Mmm, Jim, thanks for that thought. A cruise ship in the Panama Canal might be a good venue for a later book in the series! Have a great trip! – Art
So proud of you!!
Awaiting the iBook for my iPad, to inquire about your imagination and the result of your innovative industry. (Yes, it’s all about i.)
Bob A.
Bob, your incredible inventiveness is inconceivable! iBook inventory is invisible, iffy; iBook’s individual ISBN is incontrovertible: 978-0-578-13642-4. Art / Urno
Art, How exciting! I hope your story turns into a TV series. Shall I contact my friend at SyFy? In the meantime, I will order the book. Congrats! dot
Thanks, Dot! My novel is set in the near future, so there’s no time travel or people popping through dimensions or turning into Klingons. Thus the technology (being authentic) may be too humdrum for a science fiction audience. But I’d love to have more readers, so anyone you think might be interested, please let them know!
An act of accomplishment and know it will sell well !
Thanks, Joe, and thanks to you and Kaye for all your support! Hope you enjoy the final version.
Congratulations, Art! I read the book and found it to be a thriller with uncertain turns and twists that kept me from putting it down!
I am going to buy several copies to share with friends.
Keep writing!
Lydia
Thanks, Lydia! I hope you and your friends enjoy the published version. Some intimate encounters have moved off-stage so as not to slow down the mystery, and to better fit the expectations of mystery readers! The sequel is in the oven now, cooking…