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Rating: 
Summary: Solid
Review: After reading Jenny Siler's most recent novel, SHOT, I could not wait to read her first two novels: EASY MONEY and ICED. I just finished EASY MONEY and I must say that it is interesting to see the development of a writer. In MONEY, Siler has created another hard-boiled gun toting take no crap heroine who is innately the equal of any man and smarter. Allie Kerry is a courier for a guy who might be best described as a low rent Lothario with no scruples and probably the first 'guy' in Allie's life. Joey has asked Allie to pick up a package in Washington State and deliver it to Houston. What happens next is a wild ride across the underbelly of America with some volatile ingredients: a nice blend of CIA intrigue, concealed drug ops during the Viet Nam War, shootouts across the country from Bremerton to Miami and enough action to satisfy any adrenaline junky. One cannot help but believe that there is a little of Siler in each of her women characters. Siler is described as having worked as a forklift driver, a furniture mover, a grape picker, a salmon grader, a tutor to deaf students, a waitress, a sketch model, and a bartender. Blended with Siler's rather formidable educational background at Andover and Columbia her writing skills are just simply fabulous. Nothing like life experience and intellect to make a novel hum with the excitement and adventure created by Siler in EASY MONEY. Her poetic and lyrical style and interesting character creations are in a word flawless. You won't soon forget Joey, Mark, Chloe, Cyrus, Darwin, Willie Phao and John Wykel: all of these characters are well fleshed out and each has a certain edge that makes him or her unforgettable. Jenny Siler is the real deal. Siler is to the West what Faulkner was to the South. Someday, Siler will definitely be included in the pantheon of great American writers.
Rating: 
Summary: Overland Express
Review: Red hot and rolling, nothing comes easy for Allie Kerry, especially the money, as she races her blue '69 Mustang cross country from Seattle to Key West in Jenny Siler's excellent first novel, "Easy Money."Siler's artful and edgy prose, fleshy characterizations, and tightly-wound plot, gain her instant access to the male-dominated pantheon of American mystery writers. Her heroine, Allie Kerry, goes against the grain of convention and offers a welcome new perspective on the Chili Palmerized genre of tough guys. Not to be fooled, Allie Kerry is as street-smart and tough as they come. She is a free-lance courier for a Miami shyster and former lover named Joey. She makes her deliveries without asking questions and carries a gun, sometimes three, yet still fears most of all the normal life she has never had. "Of all the sh*t I have to deal with when I'm working--bungled connections, bad packages, cops--the most difficult thing for me is the American family." Allie Kerry lost her mother and was brought up by a doting drug-smuggling father, a Vietnam vet who carried home a dark secret that comes back to haunt them both thirty years later. He is found with a bullet in his head, and Allie suddenly finds herself battling the vicious ghosts of her father's past. It is the news of her father's death, and a job for Joey along the way, that puts Allie on a long road home. But the pickup in a Bremerton pool hall goes bad and, moments after her contact slips a computer disk in her pocket, she finds him dead on the men's room floor. What was supposed to be easy, "easy money," turns into a cross-country chase for her life. Dead bodies litter her trail from Seattle to Key West and pile up at home in an incredibly cinematic and realistic shoot-out with the bad guys. Jenny Siler's thriller is a triumphant debut. Her writing is solid. She draws on a colorful imagination and makes the most of her considerable talent to shape a tight story. She knows the geography between Seattle and South Florida like a Teamster, and covers Nixon's secret war in Cambodia with the insight of a vet. "Easy Money" refuses to drag. Siler delivers original characters and authentic themes and pulsating suspense. Her star has nowhere to go but up.
Rating: 
Summary: Plot problems but potential
Review: Siler knows how to write and she knows how to turn the pages. I ripped through this book and really enjoyed it. However, I found the plot a bit hard to swallow at some points (why drive a computer disk across the country? and why wouldn't the cops have nabbed the heroine's powder blue Mustang if it was all over the news?). This novel is somewhat weak, but as a first novel it oozes with potential. I'm hoping that Siler will get better in her future offerings.
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