The Probability of Murder by Ada Madison is the second book in the “Professor Sophie Knowles” mystery series. Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime (Penguin), March 2012

Dr. Sophie Knowles is a professor with a way of making even the most complex math problems fun for her students. But now she’s faced with a killer problem that will test her powers of logic and deduction.

Sophie’s weekly parties celebrating famous mathematicians and scientists are a big hit on campus. She’s enjoying the latest soiree with her students and dreaming of her upcoming getaway with her boyfriend, medevac pilot Bruce Granville, when suddenly everyone’s cell phones start ringing at once. Turns out someone is being taken out of the Emily Dickinson Library on campus–in an ambulance.

It’s Charlotte Crocker, the librarian and a good friend of Sophie. Charlotte was found dead in front of one of the library stacks. She was loved by everyone, but the detective in charge of the investigation hints that there may have been more to Charlotte than most people knew. Now Sophie must take on some rigorous deduction homework and formulate her own equation about what happened to her friend–before the chances for another murder on campus increase exponentially.

When a close friend is found murdered, Sophie learns that her friend has held back some truths about her past exploits. The more Sophie seeks out clues, the more she discovers about her friend and others involved, the quicker Sophie will have to add the pieces together to bring a killer to justice. This was a good story that was hard to put down. The solid plot had plenty of twists and turns that kept me guessing and every time I thought I knew who the killer was, the author changed directions and boy was I surprised when the killer’s identity was revealed. This second book in the series was the best one yet and I liked that I got to know Sophie better, including the secondary cast and how they fit in her life. I’m looking forward to the next assignment with Professor Knowles in this delightfully entertaining series.

Ada Madison is the pseudonym for Camille Minichino