Review: The Big Chili by Julia Buckley

The Big Chili (Undercover Dish Mystery #1)
written by Julia Buckley
narrated by Ann Marie Lee

My Rating: 4 stars

Genre: Cozy Mystery
Age Category: Adult
Type of romance: m/f

Blurb:
First in a delicious new mystery series filled with casseroles, confidences, and killers…

Lilah Drake’s Covered Dish business discreetly provides the residents of Pine Haven, Illinois, with delicious, fresh-cooked meals they can claim they cooked themselves. But when one of her clandestine concoctions is used to poison a local woman, Lilah finds herself in a pot-load of trouble…

After dreaming for years of owning her own catering company, Lilah has made a start into the food world through her Covered Dish business, covertly cooking for her neighbors who don’t have the time or skill to do so themselves, and allowing them to claim her culinary creations as their own. While her clientele is strong, their continued happiness depends on no one finding out who’s really behind the apron.

So when someone drops dead at a church Bingo night moments after eating chili that Lilah made for a client, the anonymous chef finds herself getting stirred into a cauldron of secrets, lies, and murder—and going toe to toe with a very determined and very attractive detective. To keep her clients coming back and her business under wraps, Lilah will have to chop down the list of suspects fast, because this spicy killer has acquired a taste for homicide…

My Review

I received a free copy from Tantore Audio and voluntarily reviewed this.

When I heard about this book The Big Chili I just knew I wnated to read this one. It sounded so fun with the premise of the main character cooking food for her clients so they can pass it off as homecooked by themselves. And I really like food themed cozies. I am so glad I picked this one up as it was really good.

The mystery in this one was awesome. From start to finish the mystery kept my attention. It really kept me guessing, but had enough going on and plenty of clues to make it feel like there was progress. I wasn’t sure who had done it and while there were some suspects, there was never enough clues to either of them to make me sure they were the murderer, but enough clues to suggest they could be. Then toward the end when most of the clues were there I figured it out and guessed correctly. I really liked how all the clues came together and made sense toward the end. I also like how Lilah is the one to figure out who is the murderer, before the murderer tired to kill her too. I like it when the sleuth is the one who solves the mystery. The police seemed competent enough and it was clear they were working on the case, which was nice too.

Another thing I love about this mystery was how natural it felt how Lilah got involved and how she investigated. She mostly just was somewhere or making a delivery decided to ask some questions, something happened due to which she had the opportunity to speak with someone or someone came to her with info as they were close to her. It just felt very natural and not forced, which I liked.

I really liked Lilah, she was a likable main character. I liked her passion for cooking and there are some yummy sounding dishes she makes. I like how she wants to do more with cooking and has her side business while she still works as her parents real estate business as well. It also was a fun personality quirk how she always has a song stuck in her head and while I didn’t know most of the songs mentioned, I felt like this gave her unique touch. She is pretty close to her family and has some good friends around too and I liked seeing her interact with them. I also liked her dog Nick, who has this fun thing were he seems to be nodding after she talks to him. There’s a bit of romance as well, with the police officer on the case, this is such a typical cozy mystery romance set up which I am not a big fan of. There are some sweet scenes of them, but I didn’t fully feel their romance yet as they don’t have as much chance to spend together yet.

This was a new to me narrator and it took me a bit of time to get used to her style. I did mostly enjoy it and the various voices she did worked well. I just struggled with how the volume would change and go up or down depending on the emotional tone of the scene. I am quite noise sensitive and would have to try and adjust the volume every time this happened, which was a bit annoying. The narrator was quite good at displaying the emotions of the scene in her voice.

To summarize: I had such a good time listening to this one. The mystery was really good. The way Lilah got involved made sense and the way she investigated felt natural. The mystery kept me guessing, there were plenty of clues and some plausible suspects, but only toward the end it all made sense and the clues all fit together to paint a picture of who did it. I only barely figured it out before the sleuth did. I always like it when the sleuth solves the mystery, which happened here. I liked reading about Lilah and her passion for cooking. I liked reading about her interacting with family and friends, there’s also a bit of romance and am curious to see how that will develop in future books as I wasn’t fully feeling their romance yet. I liked the different voices and emotional tone of the narrator, but struggled sometimes with the changes in volume. All in all this was a great listen and I look forward to continuing the series.

Links:
– Goodreads
– Bookbub
– Amazon
– B&N
– Kobo

You can also read my review on Goodreads and Bookbub.