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Jose Jones

Caustic stories about the emotionally dark side of sex.

Reviewed in the United States on June 14, 2008

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Few authors are able to probe the psyche of troubled women with more sure-handed skill than Mary Gaitskill. The nine stories in "Bad Behavior" bring the disturbing and psychologically true insights of its characters to life in a brilliantly blunt and matter-of-fact way.

Its best story is "Something Nice," an astoundingly incisive tale of a man who falls for the young prostitute he visits. "Secretary," like most of the stories here, works as a kind of prelude to her puissant follow-up novel, "Two Girls, Fat and Thin." Though this story does it in a completely atypical and even more unsettling way. The final story, "Heaven," a dark character piece, is an excellent change of pace from the preceding psychosexual drama.

This was Gaitskill's first published book and she definitely grew as a writer later on. The writing is occasionally simplistically arranged and at other times composed of vaguely strung-together behavioral key words that come off as a bit empty. The stories also get a tad redundant and are obviously autobiographical (Gaitskill was apparently a call girl at one time in her life).

But whatever she lacks in style, she more than makes up for in insight. Gaitskill's ability to expose the twisted, misfiring, black inner workings of her off-center characters is thrilling.

Many writers craft tales of disturbing behavior, but Gaitskill is one of the few who accurately and perceptively show you why they do it and how the characters got there.

Katy Butler

She Draws You In

Reviewed in the United States on August 19, 2023

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I am fascinated by her voice, how she notices detail, her flights of fancy in describing inner states poetically and yet skeweringly, the blend of autobiography and "fiction," the marriage of compassion and merciless wit, the admission and acceptance of her own shadow, ugly thoughts, actions, and disappointments, and perverse contrary desire. She just fascinates me as a writer. I am inexplicably drawn to reading her stuff. it resonates even though on the surface I live differently.

James D.

Not that interesting

Reviewed in the United States on November 17, 2021

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I thought I'd love these stories after reading a review, but I don't. Some of them just end, with no conclusion to the story. The characters are weird, which is nice, but impersonally drawn, so I didn't really feel or like them. The book isn't bad, just meh.
It was delivered promptly and packed well enough.

Peter Z

An Educational Book That Arrived in Good Condition

Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2023

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I ordered this book for my college literature class. My professor taught us valuable lessons with this book and we had insightful discussions. I recommend this book to anyone, not exclusively to students.

J. C. Beadles

Well written, but a total turn off

Reviewed in the United States on May 6, 2021

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This collection of short stories from the late 1980s about failed relationships is well written, but so depressing that it a total turn off. I read about half way through this short book and had no desire to continue to the end. There's too much good stuff to read instead. The stories I read mostly were about failed male-female relationships, both romantic and non-romantic social. Most of the men were abusive jerks to women and fully deserved to be portrayed negatively. The women lived and worked in what were chic neighborhoods in New York in the late 1980s. I'm sorry they were abused, but maybe they needed to move out of the insular world they lived in and seek out decent men. None of the women come across as jolly, fun, loving people, to say the least. One of the least abusive relationships portrayed was between a female sex worker and her client. I've never been a dog person, but I would have rather spent my time with dogs than any of the people in this book.

Paige Turner

Poignant. Loaded with truth.

Reviewed in the United States on March 20, 2014

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At times in her collection of short stories entitled “Bad Behavior,” author Mary Gaitskill soars to great heights. Sometimes she sneaks up on you and hits you with one of her subtle, beautiful sentences that contain great truth. There are a lot of these little moments in this book.

Some of the stories involve or refer to BDSM, but they are not prurient or sexy. For example, the genesis of the script for the movie “Secretary” comes from a short story here of the same name. In the amazing story “Romantic Weekend,” she paints a true, beautiful picture of how BDSM can be something that brings intimacy. I also truly enjoyed her poignant story about a woman who is a part-time prostitute and grows close to one of her clients. It perfectly captures the feeling of that emotion that may be love that ultimately fades. There is another melancholy story about a man and his prostitute which I won’t spoil the ending- this is among her best writing. The longest and last story was my least favorite.

Some of her sentences are lovely. A couple favorites, to give you a flavor for her writing style:

“She had said that she wanted to be hurt, but he suspected that she didn’t understand what that meant.”

“Despite their mutual ill humor, they fornicated again, mostly because they could more easily ignore each other while doing so.”

“At times she had thought that this was the only kind of connection you could have with people – intense, inexplicable, and ultimately incomplete.”

“In confusion, she withdrew from all these things, which were, after all, only the substance of her life, and viewed them from a distance.”
This is an amazing book from a relatively unheralded writer. I don’t know why it hasn’t received more recognition.

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Jill

Meh

Reviewed in Italy on February 16, 2023

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** dysfunctional sexual relationships, S&M content, disturbed characters.

Subdued female characters addicted to antidepressant and deviant male partners who enjoy humiliate the female body in a masturbatory attitude, find always a way to meet. They share particular mental issues in their obnoxious, sadomasochist way of relating; it seems to me they have severe problems related to their childhood and relationship with their parents, who may themselves be suffering from addiction and mental alienation, affecting their adult sexual lives.

A collection of short stories based in New York in the 80s, mostly autobiographic; her female characters seem to be crafted on the author's own life who worked as stripper and prostitute experiencing sexual humiliation, and somehow enjoying it, when she was 16, aspiring to be a writer: depressed married women, prostitutes, middle class men/clients, but that all felt similar, too much in my opinion, I could not tell them apart sometimes. I could not relate to any of her characters, I had to keep a detached attitude throughout the whole reading, and the author's repetitive and somewhat clinical writing did not help me much.

If you enjoy sadomasochism and meaningless sexual intercourses, that's the book for you.

Bobbie

dysfunctional relationships in 1980s New York

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 24, 2020

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Short stories aren’t usually my thing, but I was attracted to this, listed in the Guardian as one of the ten best books about something, though I can’t now remember what the something was – dysfunctional relationships, possibly, which are my thing, both in art and in life, ha ha. As a brief description, I can’t better the back-cover blurb, which reads: “Mary Gaitskill’s tales of desire and dislocation in 1980s New York caused a sensation with their frank, caustic portrayals of inner lives. As her characters have sex, fail to connect, play power games and inflict myriad cruelties on each other, she skewers urban life with precision and candour.” It does what it says on the tin, and rendered me smugly content to be self-isolating from coronavirus!

Cozooks of Brixham

An alternative take on life (alternative to my life, anyway)

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 11, 2020

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I found these stories just a bit too bleak to finish Bad Behaviour. The individual short stories seemed to run into each other and having got to the end of one and finding the next one starting off in similar vein began to bring me down. That's OK. Ms Gaitskill provides us with an alternative take on life (alternative to my life, anyway) and no author is able to carry absolutely everyone from one end of their book to the other. Whilst I doubt if I will pick Bad Behaviour back up, I am happy to have it here in my home library.

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Ellis Imitation

Reviewed in Germany on March 14, 2023

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Die Ansammlung von Kurzgeschichten erinnert in Inhalt und Stil stark an Bret Easton Ellis' The Rules of Attraction, ohne annähernd dessen Nivea zu erreichen.

Ted Jackman

Average read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 3, 2021

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Some interesting characters and stories. However, I felt that much of this was life and character observations rather than plot lines. Ok read but did not keep riveted.

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