AN APPLE BEST BOOK OF FEBRUARY
"It is almost impossible to find the words for a truly original novel
such as Bad Habits, a primal scream of a book that could be written
only by this author at this time. Amy Gentry is in utter control of this
anaconda of a story as it twists, squeezes and lashes out at the reader.
And all the reader can do is stare helplessly back, mesmerized. In case
it's not clear, I loved it."
--Laura Lippman, New York Times bestselling author of The Sunburn
and Lady of the Lake
A whip-smart psychological thriller from the author of Good as
Gone (a New York Times Notable Book), in which a grad
student becomes embroiled in a deadly rivalry that changes her into
someone unrecognizable to her struggling family, her ambitious academic
friends, and even herself
Claire "Mac" Woods--a professor enjoying her newfound hotshot status at
an academic conference--finally has the acceptance and admiration she
has long craved. But at the conference's hotel bar, Mac is surprised to
run into a face from a past she'd rather forget: the moneyed,
effortlessly perfect Gwendolyn Whitney, Mac's foil, rival, and former
best friend.
When Gwen moved to town in high school, Claire--then known as Mac, a
poor kid from a troubled family who had too much on her plate--saw what
it meant to have. Money, sophistication, culture, the very blueprints
to success. Mac had almost nothing, except the will to change. Change
she did, habitually grinding herself to work as hard as straight-A Gwen,
even eventually getting admitted into the same elite graduate program as
Gwen. But then Mac and Gwen become entangled with the department's
power-couple professors and compete head-to-head for a life changing
fellowship. The more twisted the track toward success becomes, the more
Mac has to contort herself to stay one step ahead--which deception
signals the point of no return?
Jack-knifing between Mac's world-expanding graduate days and the
crucible of the hotel and its unexpected guests, Bad Habits follows
Mac's reckoning between her hardscrabble past and tenuous present. What,
exactly, did Mac do to get what she has today? And what will she do to
keep it? With taut, powerful prose, Amy Gentry asks how far we'll go to
get what we want--and whether we can ever truly leave the past behind.
