Cooperative Lives
Patrick Finegan
Mar 2019
350 pages
General Fiction, Mystery
Provided by Rep
⭐
I found the cover to be quite interesting with the pencil sketch of the city and the block lettering for the title and author’s name like you might see on architectural drawings. Then right in the middle the scribble with the red, yellow, and green circles representative of the traffic light. It really appealed to the graphic designer in me.
The story was a different kettle of fish altogether. It started with a power failure and a guy getting locked out of his apartment because of his key card locks. No one in the condo coop would ever forget that he was the guy that got locked out during a power failure because of his key card locks. That’s how they thought of him. Others were known for their divorces or cars or fancy this or that. The residents knew each other for their pretensions, not for who they were. Even if they socialized with each other, they really didn’t know each other as people. And I suppose that’s what made the whole story possible. No one really knew anybody.
The story turns into a mystery of espionage, theft, and murder with several of the tenants involved in the commitment of the crimes and the solution of the crimes. Some got caught. Some got dead. Some got rich. Some didn’t. It was the craziest thing I think I’ve ever read. I was quite often lost and had no idea what the heck was going on or who was doing what or why. It’s not exactly a book I can recommend based on my own reading of it. Maybe someone else will have a better experience with it because their mind works differently than mine does and they’ll understand it better than I did. But this is my review and I didn’t.
a thoughtful reveal 