This is my first foray into Ms. Logan's books, and I can't tell you whether I'll make another one or not. Later on in the review, I'll inform everyone why.

Maxie Pierce and her half sister Sylvia have taken over their father's business -- which is to go from place to place selling his chili ingredients and making chili so that customers will try it and purchase items. They belong to a group of people who travel from town to town doing this. Maxie's job is mainly to wear the Chili Chick costume and dance around to draw attention to their trailer. Sylvia mainly does everything else.

But it seems Maxie had a bad date the evening before with a man named Roberto, where he got into a bar fight and ignored her the entire evening, so when he shows up wanting to see her again, and pretty much telling her it's because she has a reputation on the circuit for being "easy." she has a very public fight with him. Then, when hotshot television chef Carter Donnelly shows up, she tries to get him to try some of her father's chili that she had already made, but her sister Sylvia tries to sabotage her by getting him to try some of her own creation. What ensues is a very childish scene in which Maxie accidentally spills her bowl of chili on Carter while trying to get around Sylvia; and when she opens Carter's RV to get a towel for him, the body of Roberto tumbles down on her.

Later on, she finds that Sylvia's been arrested for Roberto's murder, and Maxie decides to help her by finding out who killed him. She's also hoping for help from the hot security guard Nick -- whom Sylvia also has her eye on -- but he wants her to leave it to the police. So Maxie's working on her own, and trying to stay away from a killer...

This is the first in this series, and unfortunately it's going to be the last one that I'm going to read. First off, Maxie and Sylvia are downright nasty people. Sylvia is self-centered, selfish, mean, and an out-and-out horrible person, while Maxie is just annoying. We never get to find out why they hate each other. From what we're told, Sylvia is two years older than Maxie. So Jack left Sylvia's mother when she was younger than that to marry Maxie's, so it can't be memories of him leaving her, because there wouldn't be any. We also find out that he spent every summer with both his daughters, so it isn't because he never spent any time with her. So what's the reason? Her mother poisoning her against her father? Yeah, that's healthy.

Then we find out that Sylvia doesn't care whether her father is found or not. She's only in it for what she can get out of it (and I'm not explaining that any further). Maxie, however, loves her father and is in it so she can figure out where he is and bring him home.

But when Sylvia is arrested, she's on her own, and her personality doesn't get any better, either. We never find out what makes either of them tick, nothing about their personalities. We don't find out about Nick's background either. There just wasn't anything to bring us into the characters, to liven them up, to make them a little bit human. They were just words on a page.

When Sylvia was exonerated -- which we knew she would be, so no surprise there -- is she grateful? Nope. She goes right back to being the nasty person she is -- which should have made Maxie pack right up and go back to her home, wherever that is (we have no idea, of course).

Which means that the murder mystery wasn't interesting. If you can't invest in the characters, why invest in the mystery? In fact, when the book was finished, I turned the page and thought: where's the rest of it? Yep. That pretty much sums it up. Where's Jack? Who does Nick like? Why do the women hate each other? I absolutely detest books that give us cliffhangers. I always feel like we're being "held hostage," in other words, being forced to purchase the next book in order to find out what happens next. I abhor them. Because of this, I won't be reading any more in this series. ( )

Great, fun romp of a mystery. Follows an amateur detective on the chili circuit. ( )

Synopsis:Maxie and Sylvia are half-sisters who don't seem to like each other very much. They wouldn't have been together in the chili business except that their father, Jack, has disappeared, leaving them with a business to run. When Sylvia is accused of killing a roadie, who in actual fact was once her boyfriend, Maxie decides to prove her innocence.
Review: The interactions between half-sisters is a bit interesting. The setting, however, is well chosen in that it provides lots of opportunities to move the stories to different locales and to encounter different characters. The underlying mystery of what happened to Jack appears to be the theme for this series. ( )

I want to say first that I'm a fan of Kylie Logan's work. She currently writes two other cozy series. One centres around a button shop and it's a lot of fun. The other one is set on an island in Lake Michigan and centres on the "League of Literary Ladies" and it's first one was, hands down, my favourite cozy read this year.

So I had no reason to think I wouldn't love this one as well. Talented author and interesting setting (I may have mentioned previously I like spices and I love growing chilli peppers) = great first in a new series. Right? Well.....

I strongly disliked the first few chapters of this book and only continued on the strength of my faith in Ms. Logan's talents. The main character and her sister dislike each other. A lot. Both are hard to like, but the sister, Sylvia, is just a nasty bitch. The MC, Maxie, is easier to find likeable, but she has a massive inferiority complex keeping her company at night and it's irritating. I'm fine with my MC's being flawed, but I draw the line at my MC's actively needing therapy. True, her recent history revolves around being royally screwed by a now-ex boyfriend, but who hasn't at one time or another? I want Maxie to be strong enough not to let that one incident define her entire existence.

The book improves a bit about 25% of the way in, mainly because Sylvia is arrested for the murder. I really don't like her at all. She showed zero redeeming qualities and I'd have been happier seeing her put away for life so she's not around in future books.

Nick Falcone is the security officer in charge at the Showdown (a travelling chill-themed show of sorts where the mystery takes place). He's not your average "security officer"; he's attractive, dresses nice, drives a nice car, obviously has a background with law enforcement, but reveals nothing about his past. Which in book land makes him hot and sexy and hopefully the love interest in future books. I don't know why this is true in book land, but I'm just as guilty of falling for it as the next person, so I don't judge. His involvement in the story made the whole book more likeable to me and somewhat softened the chip on Maxie's shoulder (although just as often made her worse, but at least he called her on it each time and didn't let her get away with her bad attitude).

The plot of the mystery was really well done. Kylie Logan can write a cozy murder plot. This isn't a murder that's hard to solve because there are so many suspects, although the victim was properly despicable and thoroughly deserved what he got. Rather, the reader learns more and more about the victim as Maxie's involvement progresses, revealing more suspects and possible motives as each new fact is learned. The victim got around! Each new fact built upon the previous ones until I was certain I knew who the killer was and I was wrong.

Running throughout this book, and presumably future books since there isn't any resolution, is the mysterious disappearance of Jack, Maxie and Sylvia's father and the owner of the spice stand they're running in his absence. There's really no forward momentum in this mystery, save for a few mentions here and there that are meant to give hope, but not much else.

I want to be clear that this was a very well written cozy. My dislike - ok, hatred - of Sylvia and my distaste for parts of Maxie's (the MC) personality were the only reasons I didn't rate this book much higher. In fact, I'll read the next one, just to see if the author tones down the characters a bit now that she no longer needs to establish their personalities. ( )

http://www.girllostinabook.com/2013/09/blog-tour-review-giveaway-chili-con.html ( )