Dr. Stanley Vetowich, the Einstein of the twenty first century, and if the Einstein letters are to be believed, equally relationship challenged, heads an elite scientific team that demonstrates the feasibility of an anti-missile sonic screen.
Because the cost of providing power for this sonic screen - the Vetowich Wall - is enormous and because the Evil Empire has crumbled, congress will not fund the project.
Undaunted, Dr. Vetowich takes his scientific secrets to the Everglades and develops a sonic screen that will keep mosquitoes out of an acre of swampland on the power of a Volvo engine.
Someone decides that Dr. Vetowich needs to die. Is it a jealous ex-lover? A current lover? A rejected seductress? A foreign agent or the Cuban mafia raising cane in southeast Florida?
Suspects include Dr. Laaksonnenn a scientist and MBA who was the director of the Vetowich Wall Project. Deeply in debt and under threats on his life from creditors, Laaksonnenn banks on the Vetowich genius to bail him out.
In spite of his genius and in addition to his lack of social graces, Dr. Vetowich believes Astrology is a science. Based on astrological data, Vetowich trusts Laaksonnenn.
He also trusts, but is amused by Dr. Janet Marchmont, a scientific colleague with whom he had an affair during the process of converting the Vetowich Wall to a peaceful purpose.
He treats her badly and inadvertently sets her up as a prime suspect among those who wish him dead.
A desperate businessman whose Everglades resort would thrive with the scaled-down Vetowich Wall, an Israeli agent posing as a representative of the British Home Office, an English secretary, a hired hit man, a massive football player - turned actor, and his idea of the ultimate female, round out the list of those with a motive to make an attempt on the scientist's life.
Collier County's nationally acclaimed detective team of Matthews and Haddad successfully race with the F.B.I. and the Naples City Police to solve the case.
Ultimately, Matthews and Haddad appear to prevail.
