Airtight by J. P. Smith, a Mysterious Review.

Review: Two college friends meet up decades later, both experiencing dire financial straits, and realize that a solution to their problems may lie in the past in Airtight, a stand-alone thriller by J. P. Smith.

College student Nick Copeland was on a bad acid trip and on the brink of losing his mind … or his life. His dorm neighbor and soon to be new friend, Rob Johnson, sat with him day and night until Nick could regain his sanity. Thirty years later Nick finds himself in the throes of recession, laid off from his job, deep in debt. His children are in a private school and his wife has taken a job at a pre-school to try to help make ends meet until Nick can be fully employed again. As fate would have it he runs into Rob, who had also lost his job. Plus, his wife had divorced him leaving him without his home and family. They begin to reminisce about their days in college and that brings back a memory of their burying two airtight jars of high-grade heroin on the school campus. If they could find them now that could be an answer to both their financial problems. It sounds simple enough in theory. They make a plan to go back to their college on Homecoming Weekend, locate the jars of heroin, unearth them and get hold of a buyer. They soon find out, however, that drug dealing today is not quite as trouble-free as it was thirty years ago …

Airtight is a dynamic crime thriller that has a strong element of adventure to it. The emotional roller coaster these two men are on is depicted well here, from their financial depression to the giddy expectation of hidden riches to the realization that cashing in means dealing with individuals, who seem to move with ease across the very blurred line that marks which side of the law one is on. This is an exciting novel with plenty of unexpected twists and turns for Nick and Rob … and the reader.

Special thanks to guest reviewer Betty of The Betz Review for contributing her review of Airtight.