A smart mystery thriller of economic class, ambition, personality, and to what lengths a person will go to fight, and keep, their hard-won position in life.

Bad Habits is the story of Claire, a professor enjoying the pinnacle of her career with a noteworthy presentation at an elite hotel, when she is shocked to see her nemesis and former best friend, Gwen, in the hotel bar. Waking up the next day, addled from a serious hangover, Claire struggles to see through her foggy memory and what she may have said to Gwen the night before. She needs to know “how much” Gwen knows. As her mind reels, Claire takes us back to her teen years when she first met the wealthy and sparkling Gwen, and to their post-grad college years, when everything fell apart.

Well-constructed and well crafted, Bad Habits keeps the reader guessing as to what exactly Claire is so desperate to keep hidden and why.

If there are any critiques about this novel, there are two small things that come to mind: 1) The lackluster title, which doesn’t intrigue a reader nor describe the novel’s content in any meaningful way; and 2) It suffers a bit in comparison to a similar story this reader recently reviewed, Susie Yang’s White Ivy. While the story line of Bad Habits is a lot more satisfying and sensical than White Ivy, it flagged behind a bit in both wit and sense of place.

Sure to be a favorite of those who love a thriller that keeps you guessing, Desiree did find Bad Habits an enjoyable read that’s worth the reader’s time.

A big thank you to Amy Gentry, Mariner Books, and NetGalley for providing a free Advanced Reader Copy in exchange for this honest review.

Bad Habits is available February 2, 2021 in Hardcover, Paperback, Audio CD, and for Kindle. For a copy of Bad Habits, please consider purchasing from BookShop.org, the online bookstore that donates 75% of the book’s profit margin to independent bookstores. Desiree does receive a small commission if you purchase through this link, however, she shares this out of her enduring love for corner, indie book stores everywhere.

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Bad Habits
By the author of the best-selling thriller GOOD AS GONE
by Amy Gentry
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
You Like Them
Mariner Books
Mystery & Thrillers
Pub Date 02 Feb 2021 | Archive Date 22 Mar 2021

I enjoyed this psychological thriller. First book I have read by this author. I will recommend this book for those who like to pay attention to detail in character study.
4 star

I received an advanced copy of this book through NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. I've read Gentry's books and enjoyed this one nearly as much as her first As Good as Gone.

You don't need the be a philosophy student to enjoy this book, so don't get bogged down by Mac's graduate studies. The most important parts to focus on are her upbringing and introduction to Gwen, as well as her future flash forwards. I can definitely understand why this book could be considered a psychological thriller as well as a character study. We get unreliable introspection into Gwen and Bethany. Throughout the book, we see just what lengths Mac will go to accomplish her goals. The ending really had me. What she finds out, I had suspected something but this was a real jawdropper. I think you will enjoy this book upon it's release.

Yes, I am super early with my review for this book but wow. Get this book on your wish lists. A terrifically intelligent and creepy story of friendships and betrayal. I am also a University student at the moment and loved the academic side of this story. Fantastic. Highly recommended.

I loved Amy Gentry's first two books, but this one is on another level. Enthralling, sexy, and gorgeously written, with echoes of Patricia Highsmith and Megan Abbott. I couldn't put it down!

Wow! In BAD HABITS, Amy Gentry deftly explores power struggles and their subtle—and not so subtle—shifts and consequences. As the truth of what happened one night a decade ago claws its way to the surface you’ll be switching your allegiances from left to right and back again. Whip-smart, and beautifully written, BAD HABITS is one hell of an exploration of what can happen when friendship tangos with an insatiable appetite for success and control. This novel is unexpected, surprising and has a diabolical ending I won’t forget any time soon.

The characters were hard to like but somehow that made the book better for me. It is another rich girl vs poor girl story but it really gets a hold of you. I really enjoyed this book.

Claire finally has everything she wanted. She’s at the top of her academic field and she’s up for tenure. But everything comes at a price, and when she runs into her ex-best friend at her Keynote address, she remembers all to clearly what she sacrificed to get here.

This wasn’t terrible, it just wasn’t for me. I wasn’t invested at all. I didn’t connect to any of the characters, the storyline dragged and wasn’t all that exciting. The mystery of it all kept me reading, but even that you could see coming a mile off.

Bad Habits is billed as a psychological thriller, and the opening scene, when two former best friends and rivals (poor girl Mac and rich girl Gwen) encounter each other at a conference, made me expect a sharp, entertaining story with a thriller twist. Unfortunately, after a long dive backward into Mac's dreary childhood, the book becomes a tale of academic ambition and pretension and grad students drinking their way toward advanced degrees in a cult-like "Program." The quality of the writing is excellent, but not a single character seemed relatable or even believable. I struggled to finish it. and admit to skimming and skipping many pages. My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to read a new novel by an author whose previous book I found very enjoyable.

***Thanks to NetGalley for providing me a complimentary copy of BAD HABITS by Amy Gentry in exchange for my honest review.***

Mac, a former child pageant winner until her father left the family, now a poor teenager often forced to care for her autistic sister, feels lucky to be befriended by Gwen, a wealthy, brighter girl. Later, Mac follows Gwen to a prestigious grad school called The Program. Ten years later, now called Claire, she encounters Gwen in a hotel bar and the former friends confront the reason for their estrangement.

AS GOOD AS GONE was one of my favorite books, so I was excited to receive an ARC of BAD HABITS. BAD HABITS is a better book than my enjoyment of it. For me the book started off strong. I empathized with Mac and her situation as a child and teen. She began losing me in grad school and by the time she was Claire, I didn’t like her one bit.

BAD HABITS is purposeful steeped in academic pretentiousness, imbalances of power and lack of ethics, which I normally love. I prefer books that have someone to root, even if the character is unlikable. Claire had a coldness that prevented me from rooting for her. Amy Gentry wrote that descent into sociopathy in a completely believable and understandable way. Her meticulous attention to detail and character is part of her strength as a writer.

BAD HABITS is another solid effort from Amy Gentry.

Not quite the thriller I was hoping for, and finishing it was a bit of a struggle. The characters weren't very likeable, especially Mac, who will do anything it takes to get to the top of the class, including lying and deceiving her best friend, Gwen. For awhile, I thought it was going to to turn out to be a great book, but about halfway through, it lost its appeal. This book was just not for me, but maybe others would enjoy it more..

Bad Habits is the story of Mac aka Claire, who will stop at nothing to live out her dream of becoming an academic. I just laughed out loud while I typed that sentence, but this book was pretty good overall. There are parts of the premise that are kind of shaky, but give me a sordid college drama any day. The book flashes between the present day, when Claire runs into her former best friend (rich-and-perfect Gwen) at a conference, and her childhood and college years. I really enjoyed the college years portions of the story and her majorly dysfunctional relationships with her professors, but didn't feel that the sum of her younger years really added up to who Claire turned out to be in the end. Recommended for someone looking for a smart, character-driven psychological thriller.

Like many other reviewers noted, this wasn't as much of a thriller as expected. For that and a few other reasons, I really struggled to finish it. The concept was really interesting, though, and I would definitely try other books by this author.

As other reviewers have mentioned, this book seemed more like a character study than a psychological thriller. There wasn’t too much that thrilled me, because there was so much negativity, backstabbing, and resentments; throw in unlikable characters all, inappropriate student-teacher behavior and you have a nice whipped up mess. Tastes good the first bite, then you realize it wasn’t very tasty to begin with.
Thanks to Netgalley, the author and publisher for an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I have been a Twitter fan of Amy Gentry for a long time, but due to my bad habit (haha, see what I did there) of prioritizing ARCs, I hadn't read any of her published work yet. So I jumped at the chance to download this forthcoming release, and I'm so glad I did. I will now be prioritizing her backlist.

BAD HABITS is a deep character study, with professor Claire/Mac Woods as its center. As the novel opens, Claire is a professor who has just finished giving a keynote at a conference. She's at the hotel with a young graduate student she plans to take back to her room - when she spots her ex-best friend, Gwen, at the bar. After years of not seeing Gwen, Claire wants to reconnect. But there is a sordid reason why they haven't been in touch - and the story is unfurled in flashbacks, when Claire went by her first name, Mackenzie/Mac. The women grew up together and went off to the same school, Dwight Handler University, to study an esoteric field called "Emerging Studies." But the magnetic woman who ran the program - Bethany Ladd - drove a wedge between them. And Mac realized just how far she could go to get what she wanted.

There is so much good stuff in this book - from the deft, surprising writing to the subtle turn of the plot. Tension simmers on every page, from Mac's background of growing up with a mother on drugs and a sister with special needs, to the secrets Bethany carries with her that seed the entire Emerging Studies program. There's also humor, highlighting how ridiculous academics can get when they get all up into their own thoughts. The thrills are a slow burn, but once the suspense ratchets up, readers will be glued to the pages. I'm excited to recommend this one to my fellow writers and library patrons.

Bad Habits is a riveting character study of a driven woman, Mac, consumed by jealousy of her best friend, Gwen. Certainly not a likable, ethical, relatable nor trustworthy person but yes, definitely fascinating. As is the plot - set in the modern day (for one eventful evening only) at a hotel for a conference Mac runs into Gwen after many years of estrangement. Now with appropriate flashbacks we learn of their friendship since childhood, relationship through school and college and their lives up to this evening. I enjoyed the first half better when I was unsure of the outcome which could have gone in a myriad of directions. Some of the college scenes seemed repetitive and their pseudo Intellectual conversations seemed unnecessary. Not so much a thriller as promised, it held my attention until the last 20 pages or so which built to a disappointing contrived and rather implausible ending. Perhaps I expected more after the authors previous novel which I enjoyed so much more.

I'm not sure how I feel about this book overall, but it was one of the strangest books I've read in a long time. I'm giving it 3 stars, but would say it's more of a 3 and 1/2.

The story took a while to ramp up, and at one point, I stopped reading (a few chapters in), but then picked it back up again because I wanted to make sense of what the book was about and where it was going. I'm glad I did, because the book was hard to put down once the story began to flow. But while entertaining to read, I kept thinking, "where is this going?"

The characters were all very unusual. The underlying theme is money - not having enough of it, struggling to get it, and how having money makes for an easier life. Money is the goal for everything Mac does as she tries to both support her family, and wash her hands of her mother. The relationship between Mac and Gwen was presented in a conflicting way. They were best friends, yet, there was a lot of distrust there, and it felt like Mac craved Gwen's well-to-do life, and Gwen pitied Mac. And the relationship between Mac and Bethany was probably the most unusual of them all.

"The Program" felt weird and cult-like. None of the students seemed aware of what they were supposed to be learning, and as a reader, I was clueless.

The reveal at the end was highly implausible, and I wished there could have been a more satisfying wrap-up of the story.

really good storyline. The characters weave together very well and it's both hard to like and dislike some of them at the same time. We can all relate to the injustice of the Joyner project as well.

I read alot and rarely find one that grabs my attention but turns out to be so disappointing. Did NOT finish, I read to about 70% and it occurred to me that I wasn't enjoying myself, it wasn't an escape, I didn't like a single character or care what happened to them. Reading it was depressing. Life is too short!! Here's my thoughts on what I did read: It's obvious the author is very smart because the professor's ramblings are so 'deep' that even the MC is confused. Not the place for that, unless you want to make your readers feel dumb? Do you know what an ethnomusicologist is? That's the sort of thing you will learn in this book.

Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC. The opinions expressed in this Review are my own.

Extremely fast paced thriller about a friendship that turns toxic after too much jealousy. Claire (called Mac when she was a child) grew up under rough circumstances, with a sister with special needs who was very reliant on her and not much money for school. With hard work and scholarships Clare is able to go to college and rise through the ranks of academia. Claire’s friend Gwen comes from very different circumstances, with access to money her life seems much easier. As the story progresses you find that even when someone’s life looks perfect it doesn’t mean it is. With a lot of focus on academics this novel is not to be missed.