I thought this book sounded interesting from the blurb but wasn’t sure if I would really get into it since it didn’t sounded gripping or addictive, but… I low-key obsessed over this book! It's a murder-mystery without being your typical psychological thriller but also not a cozy mystery. And it's full of complicated characters that give plenty of depth to the story without relying on lots of twists and turns or unreliable narrators or other unbelievable elements. Just raw, real characters in an unclear situation having normal reactions.

Katie True is a jaded, unambitious tarot card reader in a Russian tchotchke shop at a dead mall. Her parents and sister think she's wasting her potential and keep asking her what her big plan for life will be. Feeling a little lost and she makes friends with Marley, a girl who works in the punk shop across the way at the mall. in Katie's mind, they're best friends, bonding over their shared work breaks and one memorable night out. When Marley disappears and a strange man walks disoriented into her shop, Katie uses her "psychic" skills to try to make a few bucks bucks on a reading, but accidentally finds out that Marley is dead - shot in the head and left next to a dumpster outside the mall. What ensues is a strange but entertaining trip along with Katie while she amateurky but effectively investigates Marley's disappearance... From the disoriented thug in the shop to Marley's boss, her boyfriend, a cop that wants to help even though there really isn't a case, Katie’s brother, and a whole lot of brash confidence, she finds out that she never eve knew the person she thought was her best friend.

I love the cover of this book! The neon colors really drew me in. I wanted to love this book and thought it had so much potential. I found beginning of the book was good but then it just fell flat for me.

Thank you Net Galley for the ARC!

This was cute and overall enjoyable but at times felt a bit disconnected. I couldn’t tell at first if it was trying to be serious or quirky and in the end it kind of felt like a dark episode of a Disney channel sitcom. The characters were a bit over-exaggerated and were quick to get familiar with each other which made them seem all the more unbelievable but we’re overall loveable.

That being said it was a fun, easy read. There were elements of it that reminded me a bit of the Finlay Donovan series, so if you’re a fan of those I’d recommend checking this one out!

Oh how I had fun with this one..

From the moment I started I was hooked. An engaging murder mystery that had me saying “just one more chapter” because I wanted to get to the bottom of it. With a dash of comedic relief. And a plot twist.

I loved Katie. She was hilarious, and a wild ride. And her partnership with Jamie made it even better. Their sarcasm and banter added a nice touch. Truly couldn’t get an enough of them.

Overall it was an easy, intriguing read that I did not put down until I finished it. I wish the ending wasn’t so abrupt. It could’ve used a little bit more of a spark. BUT it didn’t take away from my overall enjoyment. And it’s a great spooky season book.

Katie True returned home from Chicago and now jumps from job to job. When she meets Marley, they immediately form a bond. Marley encourages Katie to continue with the tarot, but Katie soon reads the cards for a man who has a picture of Marley with a gunshot wound to the head. This was something her tarot cards couldn't predict, and Katie is determined to figure out what happened. This puts Katie in the middle of a much larger threat.

We start with the tarot reading in her store, then see how the friendship with Marley developed. She doesn't leave well enough alone, following the man from the mall, and continues to stay involved even after the police point out the failing in such a decision. If she stayed home we wouldn't have much of a story, but everything she does is well within the range of a normal twentysomething. She isn't super-powered or especially gifted at detection, though she's very good at reading people. She cares deeply about her family and friends, even though she doesn't have many of those. Her genuine desire to help isn't always appreciated by the police, though they realize she was caught up in circumstances she couldn't help. It's a really fun book to read and I enjoyed how the end pulled it all together.

I wasn't sure how I felt about a tarot-themed book, but I really liked this one!

It's not a classic cozy, but has a bit of the cozy feel with an amateur detective getting in the way of an attractive police officer.

Katie was a great character, an underemployed underachiever in her family but who has a talent at reading people like tarot cards.

Overall I thought Play the Fool had a great blend of character development, suspense, and even a little romance. Hoping this will be a series!

Play the Fool gave me Poker Face vibes (a show I just love). I feel like I want to know more about the characters, so if this is going to be the first in a series, it's a great start. As a stand alone, it doesn't satisfy in character development. I want Katie to continue finding herself. I want to see her learn and grow. I wasn't as attached to Marley. But the feelings Katie had for her and the loss of her made me really feel for her.

This was a quick read. It was a bit all over the place but enjoyable nonetheless. Katie was an interesting MC and I am curious as to why the author made her such a hapless and messy person. I wished we got more from Jamie as I found him the most interesting with his backstory and general vibe. I enjoy that there were some darker moments in this but it is definitely on the cozier side. Overall, if you are in the mood for a mystery this will fit the bill!

Play the Fool is an inventive cozy mystery featuring a tarot card reader who discovers her best friend's murder and sets out to find the killer.

Katie True is a bit of a hot mess. It's working a small job in the mall that she meets Marley, a take-no-prisoners, outgoing girl who convinces Katie begin soothsaying to make a little extra cash on the side. But when Marley doesn't show up to work and Katie takes a peak at a client's phone and sees an image of her best friend dead with a gunshot wound to the head, Katie soon discovers the cards don't hold all the answers.

Intercutting a mystery with the art and meaning of tarot was such a fun and imaginative way to bring in imagery and symbolism to the story! I enjoyed how the author chose to explain the cards and make them relevant to the moments in time they show up.

From the beginning I wasn't a huge fan of the narration or writing style in this book. I found it a little stilted, even though the action begins on the first page. I also feel like this is a case of mismatched marketing for Play the Fool, because while it is categorized as a mystery/thriller, it definitely reads more as a tongue-in-cheek cozy mystery (which can have thriller elements!) and for a book that walks the line between genres, I feel like the writing needed to be cleaner and less stylized. I also really found myself disliking Jamie from the beginning, his entire character felt shoehorned into the story and I just didn't find myself enjoying him or the romance set up.

Overall, I wish I had liked this more. I had high hopes for the novel because the premise was so interesting, but it just wasn't executed in a way that I enjoyed. I would like to think I would try another novel by Chern, especially if the concept is as inventive as this one, but Play the Fool wasn't for me!

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group, Ballantine, and Bantam for providing me a copy of this book for an honest review.

Play the Fool- thank you @netgalley and @penguinrandomhouse this one rerelease today! It’s follows a cynical tarot card reader who attempts to solve her friends mysterious murder. A fun whodunit with some dark humor mixed in, this one sounds great!
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big thank you to @netgalley & @randomhouse for providing this ARC!
Happy Pub Day 🎉

Katie True is at another dead-end job when she meets Marley, a woman who also works in the mall and becomes Katie's friend over lunches.
While Katie isn't good at holding down jobs, she is good at reading tarot cards. When a man comes into the store she works at with a wound bleeding from his head, she tries to read his cards to give him guidance on what to do. When she takes a glimpse at his phone -because reading tarot is about reading people -she sees a picture of Marley dead. Now Katie is determined to figure out what happened.

I was so excited to receive this ARC since i’m an avid lover of tarot cards (my cats name is even tarot) and it did not disappoint!
I was on the edge of my seat needling to know what happened to Marley. I enjoyed learning about Katie, her life and her history with tarot cards. This was a good mystery with a strong female character. I was blown away by the ending completely. solid read!

Katie True has a dead end job in a dying mall, and Marley is her friend who works in a store in the same wing. Or she did.
One day a suspiciously bloody customer comes in, and Katie does a tarot reading for him - a skill she picked up when around her Aunt as a kid. When he steps away she snoops on his phone for personality clues and instead sees a photo of her friend, with a shot to the head.

She needs to find out what happened, but it’s hard to get the police to investigate a murder when there’s no body, only she saw the evidence, and her own investigation keeps her popping up where she shouldn’t belong.

During her search for answers Katie finds out she didn’t know Marley near as well as she thought, ignored red flags, inconsistencies and half told stories because it was nice to have a friend. But she does find one helpful officer, and in Jamie’s off time they work together to solve the mystery.


There are a whole slew of side characters ranging for awesome people to The Absolute Worst, and some that changed my opinions along the way. The only thing holding me back from rating this book higher, was that I didn’t end up feeling an emotional attachment to them.

Katie using the people reading skills she honed reading cards to get information from people - better than officers trained in interrogation - was super amusing and probably one of my favorite things.

And no spoilers, but I really liked the resolution at the end.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Ballantine for the ARC

Inventive and entertaining take on the modern whodunnit, this quirky tale gives us an unlikely heroine you can’t help but fall in love with. When Katie’s new, mysterious best friend suddenly turns up missing, she must use all of her questionable and lackluster talents to solve the case. Thank goodness she’s up to the task.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my free copy. These opinions are my own.

What a clever debut for a Lina Chern! Play the Fool does a good job of mixing together fun and mystery into a thrilling, captivating ride.

The plot does sometimes benefit from suspension of belief as the events could be a little unbelievable in the real world, but that’s also what made it entertaining. This was a book where I was content to just go with the flow and was along for the ride no matter the twists and turns. The characters were dynamic and well developed, making Katie’s world a fascinating one. I particularly liked the use of tarot cards and everything I learned about that world by reading this book!

This was a super fun read I really enjoyed it was super hooked from the first page couldn't put it down!

Katie is at work giving a man a tarot card reading when she decides to sneak a peak at his phone. What she sees is shocking and horrifying. It’s a photo of her friend Marley, dead from an apparent gunshot wound. She immediately jumps into her own investigation to find what happened to her friend.

The book is full of mystery, sometimes unbelievable, but that’s the fun in fiction sometimes. I really loved the first half of the book, but then it fell a little flat and picked back up for a good ending. The cover is gorgeous!

Thank you to Lina Chern, Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine, and NetGalley for an advanced e-copy in exchange for my honest review.

Play the Fool by Lina Chen is her debut novel but you would never know that when you read it. This is a uniquely written whodunit that kept me guessing throughout the entire book. It is a fast paced mystery with humor mixed into it. The main character is a little reckless but she believes in Tarot Cards, which I did not know much about at first, but found it quite interesting and fun. I really enjoyed this one and it would be a good mystery/spooky read in October. I hope to see more from this new author.

Thank you NetGalley, Bantam Books/Random House and Lina Chen for this humoristic story to read and review. The opinions expressed are my own.
#netgalley. #bantambooks #randomhouse.
#linachen. #playthefool. #arc. #debutnovel

I want to start off by saying that I think this is a solid murder mystery. I didn't hate it, but I also didn't really love it either. I'm not sure why, but I just didn't feel the sense of urgency that I typically like to experience when reading a mystery/thriller. The mysteries I enjoy the most keep me on the edge of my seat begging to turn to the next page because I just have to figure out what is happening. This book started out with an interesting premise and a good setup in the beginning, but it ultimately just didn't sustain the level of intensity I wanted. It didn't help that I saw all of the twists coming from pretty early on in the book.

My favorite thing about the book was the main character. Katie was an absolute mess. She couldn't hold a job, lived in squalor, and had no real plans for her life. She was super impulsive and just bounced from thing to thing. I was captivated by her hot mess of a life, and the main reason I kept reading was to find out what kind of disaster she would create for herself next. She did grow quite a bit, though, and learned a lot about herself from the things she experienced in the story. I also really loved how the use of tarot was weaved into the story through her character. She saw people and the world through the cards, and her instincts were fun to follow. I honestly wish the author had leaned even harder into the tarot/mystical aspect of the story, but I also liked the focus on how Katie had learned to pick up on clues and read people that way.

One of my biggest problems with the book was that I didn't find much of it to be very believable. From the start, I questioned why Katie would react the way she did to the supposed death of someone she barely knew. I get the sentiment behind it. She didn't really have any friends and thought she might finally have one in Marley, but it all just felt a bit too extreme of a reaction. Katie's interactions with the police also didn't seem very believable. As the story unwound, it just became more and more impossible for me to suspend my disbelief at some of the circumstances. Katie seemed to always get out of trouble easily even though she did some REALLY stupid stuff.

I also didn't think there were many compelling themes in this book. The standout issue was Katie learning to be true to herself and pursue her strengths and passions in her own way. There could have been interesting explorations into policing, but instead a nuanced commentary on how police handle cases like this one was swept aside for the cop romance. I get that not every book needs to be thematically complex, but it just seemed like a big missed opportunity.

Overall, this was an easy read with some entertaining characters and a decent mystery. If you are looking for something quick that isn't too complex and are able to suspend disbelief for a bit, you'll probably have a good time with this one. I was just hoping for something a bit more. Therefore, I rate this book 3 out of 5 stars.

A surprisingly enjoyable read! Katie is a tarot reader who is dissatisfied with her life. She meets another reader, Marley, and feels a strong connection. Soon after, Marley is murdered and Katie goes on a journey to find what happened to her and peels back more layers than she anticipated. The characters are memorable and the dialogue pops off the page-sharp and smart. Katie is a broken anti-hero almost but one you can’t help but root for her to find her redemption. The tone reminds me of Finley Donovan, but there is a surprising amount of depth to the characters and the ache in Katie. Admittedly, the conclusion is far-fetched but it does fit in with the tone of the story. I hope this is the start of a new series and I will be watching for the next installment if so!

Arc provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was a fun and clever debut from Lina Chern! I don’t read too many mysteries but I enjoy a classic whodunit. It took me a little to get into the story, but once I did it was hard to put down. I liked the addition of the protagonist being a tarot card reader; I think it added a unique element to the story. I found the main character to be a bit unlikeable at times, but I was still rooting for her. There was a quirky, sometimes unhinged, cast of characters and I enjoyed them all. I didn’t predict the ending, but I was hoping for a more shocking reveal. This was a fun read that explored some deeper subjects, such as loneliness and trauma, which added some depth to the story. Overall, this was an enjoyable reading experience and I look forward to reading more from the author in the future.