Iced (John MacRae Books) [Hardcover]

Jenny Siler (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 11, 2001 | Series: John MacRae Books

From the author of the New York Times Notable Book Easy Money, a riveting suspense novel about a headstrong repo woman in Montana.

On Missoula's coldest day of the year, the police pull Clay Bennett's corpse from the weeds. For the cops, his death is an open-and-shut case, the result of a drunken brawl gone out of control. For repo woman Meg Gardner, who'd been looking to snag Bennett's Jeep, his death is an opportunity: without him around to make life difficult, the job should be a breeze. But rumors about a mysterious missing military plane --and about her own father's other family --leave Meg feeling decidedly uneasy about the cops' casual assumptions.

Only one year out of prison, romantically involved, and working the first legitimate job she's ever had, Meg has a lot to lose. So when Bennett's Jeep is stolen from outside her house, instinct and experience demand she walk away. Driven by haunting suspicions and ghosts from her past, however, Meg plunges full speed ahead -- and finds herself implicated in a dangerous web of infidelity, greed, and murder.

With searing prose and nonstop action, Jenny Siler's second novel confirms her status as a brilliant new suspense writer.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In Meg Gardner, who's trying to put her life together after a string of small-time crimes and an 18-month stretch in prison, Jenny Siler has created another edgy, unsentimental heroine whose murky relationship with her father informs this gritty thriller just as it did for Allie Kerry, the protagonist of Easy Money, Siler's heralded debut novel. And Iced, set in the brilliant freezing glare of Montana in winter, is a worthy follow-up.

Meg's working her first legitimate job in years as a repo woman. Told to pick up former air force pilot Clay Bennett's Jeep, she's not exactly grief- stricken when she hears that Bennett's been killed in some kind of drunken exchange with a young Indian woman--it will make her job a lot easier. There's something familiar about the woman, Tina Red Deer, but until Bennett's Jeep is stolen from outside Meg's house and her life is threatened over a briefcase that was in his car, she doesn't make the connection between Bennett's supposed killer and her father's long-ago affair with a Native American woman that led him to abandon Meg and her mother. Even then, the connections are slow in coming. Meg has her hands full just trying to stay alive once it's clear that Bennett's briefcase seems to be missing some maps that a couple of very dangerous people will do anything to get--including kill the only man she's loved and trusted since her father deserted her.

The plot is less clear-cut than it might be, and Meg's connection with Tina Red Deer, while psychologically interesting, isn't successful from a novelistic point of view. Meg herself remains the center of the mystery; one senses that only a few of her many dimensions have been explored here, owing to the limitations of the plot. But there are flashes of sheer brilliance in the narrative and wonderful metaphorical descriptions of an unforgiving landscape:

Growing up, I loved the fire season, the perpetual dusk that hung over the valley, the extraterrestrial sunsets ... some afternoons, when lightning storms raked across the mountains, dozens of small fires smoldered in the thick cover of the evergreens. If I think of my life in terms of combustion, it's this kind of lightning fire that comes to mind. Not a flash immolation but a slow kindling, a red ember smoking for hours, even days, until it explodes in the dry underbrush and the forest bursts into fiery tongues. Though I can't pinpoint the instant when my life ignited, there are important moments I go back to again and again. Like the day almost 20 years ago when my mother shot my father.

Iced is a strong successor to an auspicious debut, one that will leave the reader longing for Siler's next. --Jane Adams

From Publishers Weekly

Having established herself as one of the new talents in tough gal crime fiction with last year's Easy Money, Siler stays with the form in her latest, though she introduces a new lead character and locale. Her protagonist is Meg Gardner, a hard-living, whiskey-drinking repo woman from Missoula, Mont., just out of prison for stabbing her boyfriend. Gardner isn't looking for trouble, but when she stumbles onto a crime scene in the middle of a routine repossession, she finds herself mixed up in a sticky investigation into the death of local travel agent Clayton Bennett. On the back seat of the dead man's SUV is a briefcase containing a bunch of maps of the remote mountains north of town. Before Gardner can return the car to the repo company, two tough individualsDa Russian mobster and a brute of a womanDdrop by for a visit, demanding the briefcase. Gardner gives it to the Russian, then starts poking around into Bennett's private life. She learns of a mysterious incident nearly 50 years earlier in which Bennett, at the time an Air Force reserve pilot, crash-landed a plane high in the Bitterroots range. Given up for dead, he reemerged two months later, babbling incoherently. Ever since, Bennett has been trying to locate the crash site. Gardner, and now several others, want to know why. Though it lacks a solid punch at its end, Siler's second novel shows fine movement and rhythm. She handles the hard-boiled writing style with a natural grace, never sounding forced or stagy. Her flashback-heavy construction of Gardner's character gets tiresome, but it effectively reveals Gardner as a complex soul, faithless and dour, as rugged as the Montana wilderness. Agent, Nat Sobel. Author tour. (Jan. 11)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.; 1st edition (January 11, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805064389
• ISBN-13: 978-0805064384
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,803,110 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Iced is a chilling Montana winter's tale!, January 22, 2001

By 

Rebecca Brown "rebeccasreads" (Clallam Bay, WA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Iced (John MacRae Books) (Hardcover)

When Clay Bennett's corpse is pulled from some frozen weeds the Missoula Cops think they have an open-and-shut case - a brawl gone awry. For repo woman Meg Gardner, intent on getting Bennett's Jeep back, it's the break she's been looking for. Trouble is someone else wants the auto too. In a bitter December night, Meg stumbles into a dangerous bunch of Russian thugs intent on messing with her mission.

Meg Gardner is an unlikely heroine fraught with glorious & damaging childhood memories; a recent past that's far from squeaky clean; a lover who's too good for her & the chance for sublime domestic bliss. A chance two unusual & equally lethal opponents ruthlessly undermine.

Bring out your sweater, put another log on the fire & settle in for a rip-snortin' whodunit in the dead of a Montana winter. Brrr - couldn't tell if I was shivering from the yarn or the cold! Do visit my site for my full review & eInterview with this lively author.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars WORTH READING, February 13, 2001

By 

Pamela Stone - See all my reviews

This review is from: Iced (John MacRae Books) (Hardcover)

ICED takes place in Missoula Montana, where Meg Gardner an ex- con turned repo woman, is trying to get her life together. Meg has to repo a jeep belonging to Clay Bennett, the same Clay Bennett that was just found dead. Meg figures that it will be easy to get the jeep back, but once she has it back the trouble starts. Someone else wants the jeep, next thing you know Meg is drawn into a murder mystery involving sex and violence. As Meg tries to solve the mystery she must deal with her own ghosts from her past as well as deal with Russian thugs and Tina Red Dear, a Native American woman who could very well be her half sister. I thought that ICED was well written but left me with to many unanswered questions about Megs past. The mystery involving Clay Bennett was top-notch with plenty of suspense. Meg is a protagonist that really wants to be left alone to live her life low- key with coffee, cigarettes, beer, and burgers in that order.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars great drama, December 29, 2000

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Iced (John MacRae Books) (Hardcover)

After spending eighteen months in a New Mexico State penitentiary, twenty-nine-year-old Meg Gardner returns to her home in Missoula, Montana. Meg hopes to forge a relationship with her estranged parents, but fails to achieve her goal. Instead, Meg rents a small home and works as a repo person, taking possession of cars from individuals who default on their payments.

Her current job is to repossess Clay Bennett's Cherokee Jeep since the debtor is dead. Inside the vehicle, Meg notices a locked briefcase. Meg begins to open the briefcase, but has to stop when Ivan and his thugs demand she hand it over even to the point of using force. A woman comes by asking about the briefcase and Meg informs her that Ivan holds it. Next the police chief questions Meg. She learns that the deceased crashed a plane years ago and has been searching for it ever since. Soon someone threatens Meg's boyfriend and a buddy of Clay is dead. Meg has no idea what is going on, but if she is to remain alive, she better find out soon.

Jenny Siller has a lyrical style that allows readers to use their senses to vividly understand the local terrain and climate (wear a scarf it is cold up north). Through a series of flashbacks, the audience learns about the scandal surrounding Meg's parents, why she did hard time, and what she did before returning to Montana. The mystery is cleverly devised leading to a richly textured book that has several interesting levels for fans to discern.

Harriet Klausner