Three acquaintances gather at a former classmate’s apartment to fulfil a long-determined promise to create and produce the Great American Dark Comedy, with a mix of reverence for the system which nurtured them, but irreverence for those who game it without shame, leaving as prerequisites naming and taming. However, life becomes unsettled upon the discovery of a grey conspiracy theory promoted by an unrepentant website editor, and the rediscovery of a set of blue folders which beholds the source of underwriting for this shady and underhanded campaign. In addition, worlds are rocked when another friend experiences three life events in short succession, including the death of a girlfriend and loss of a job, not long after he’s weaned himself off anti-depressants and concomitant addiction to sugar highs. If truth is stranger than fiction, then what is stranger than truth? The Escape Key is a book that could only have been written during 2020.