Katie True has no prospects. Returned to the suburbs of Chicago, she knows that her job in the mall is a dead-end. Until one day, a mysterious customer enters the shop and turns her entire world upside down. The customer has a photo of a dead woman on his phone- who just so happens to be her coworker Marley. What happened to her coworker and is the photo real? When the police are slow to intervene, Katie takes on the task of discovering what really happened to Marley, armed with her trusty tarot cards.

I couldn’t stop reading once I started! Play the Fool was such an interesting book; I felt immediately hooked by the wild premise. Katie is a deeply messy and chaotic character with an enormous heart. I loved how Katie never stopped looking for Marley, even at the expense of her own safety and security. I enjoyed how Katie used her tarot cards to gain deeper meaning into situations. One of my favorite side characters was her brother Owen, who has autism. He is a deeply caring and quietly brilliant sidekick to Katie as she tries to figure out what she wants to do with her life and searches for Marley. I would recommend Play the Fool for readers who enjoy action-packed mysteries, tarot cards, and heartfelt characters.

Play the Fool is available March 28, 2023. Thank you to Lina Chern, Bantam, and Netgalley for a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

For publisher: My review will be posted on Instagram, Goodreads, Amazon, Storygraph, and Barnes & Noble etc

3.5⭐️

The only good thing about Katie True’s latest dead end job at the tacky gift shop is the quirky girl who works at the goth clothing store down the row. Marley is the bright, carefree girl that Katie thinks she wants to be and she just so happens to be Katie’s only friend.

One day, a strange man comes into the store and Katie offers him a tarot reading. The man temporarily walks away and Katie take a look in his phone just for a jumping off point. It was an innocent invasion until she sees the picture in the man’s texts: Marley’s dead body. But without the actual body, the small police force isn’t too keen to look into the potential case. So Katie investigates herself, with a little help from the LAPD police detective who takes her seriously.

Another book where I was drawn in by the cover. I feel like this started out slow but got interesting enough to keep my attention around the middle. I feel like everyone’s personalities were a bit over the top; Katie being the unmotivated person who has never really tried for anything until this case; Marley-the manic pixie dream girl; Jamie-the traumatized cop. But at the same time their actions don’t really mesh with their personalities. I can’t really pinpoint what bothered me, but I did find that I didn’t really care about what happened to any of the characters.

Thanks Netgalley and Ballantine for providing this ARC!

All aboard the hot mess express! Play the Fool is a debut mystery about Katie True, a woman in her late 20s, who's life has hit a dead end, and who is, frankly, a hot mess. When her closest friend is murdered, she decides to solve it on her own and gets herself way in over her head. That sounds dark, but it's actually charming, quirky, and funny. It's more of a gritty cozy mystery, than thriller - with all of the hijinks Katie gets up to and the B plot of romance with the detective actually solving case. There's great neuro divergence rep, and I also really enjoyed the tarot reading aspect and I am once again saying that I really want to get my first tarot reading! I highly recommend picking this one up if you've enjoyed the Finlay Donovan series.
Thank you to NetGalley and Random House - Ballantine, Bantam imprint for the ARC.
ARC was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

Katie sees a picture of her friend dead. What follows is a mad cap race to find out what happened to Marley.
The story starts out slow. It gets a little faster paced and really had me rushing to the end.
It had some unexpected surprises
Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the early copy

I thought this had a slow start but overall enjoyed it! It was unique and would recommend to to certain friends.

I really really liked this one! Chern did a fantastic job crafting a main character who by rights should have irritated me but instead I found endearing and quirky in an utterly unexpected way. She paired that floundering protagonist with a delightfully broken detective, and the result was magical.

I enjoyed the way tarot and psychic elements were woven into the tale without ever turning it into a book about tarot or psychics. I found the characterizations fabulous. Marley was the perfect foil and a magnificent kickoff to the action. The supporting characters were a delight, most particularly Owen and Max, and I loved watching this entire cast interact because I never knew what they were going to do next.

This was a fantastic tale and I am definitely looking for more from Chern...

An engaging, thoughtful mystery. I was drawn into the story from the first chapter. The characters are flawed in a completely relatable way. You just can’t help but root for the main character, even when you know she’s making a less than ideal decision. The story had enough twists to keep me interested but stayed realistic. I enjoyed this immensely!

Play the Fool is a cute book that I enjoyed. I loved the fact that the the book was set in the Chicagoland area and wove in Tarot was a real draw in choosing to read this book. Katie True has dead end job in a mall. Her life gets more interesting when she meets another mall mate named Marley.

The book gets a little far fetched when Katie gets involved with the police and Marley's murder. I don't think the police would really let a civilian work on a case, especially one as dippy as Katie. The book does come together in the end and the mystery is resolved.

This is a cute book that is a pretty good light, pool read. I would like to thank NetGalley for an advanced copy of Play the Fool. #PlaytheFool #NetGalley

Katie True has found herself wondering or rather stumbling through life. She’s had multiple dead end jobs and doesn’t seem to be good at anything except tarot reading. Everything changes when she meets Marley. She’s the first person who seems to truly understand Katie and meets her where she is not where she’s going. Follow Katie as she unravels the mystery of a life time and finds who she is a long the way.

Katie True works at a mall shop selling Russian baubles and becomes friends with Marley, who works at a goth boutique. Katie has a history of working at different dead end jobs - the only thing she enjoys doing is reading tarot cards, a skill learned from an aunt when she was young. Katie appreciates the fact that Marley
accepts her as she is and enjoys hanging out together.
When a man enters the shop Katie works at, she does a reading for him and peeks at his cellphone. She's shocked to see a picture of Marley with a gunshot in her temple near a dumpster at the mall. When she checks out the location later, the body has disappeared.
Katie is determined to discover what happened to Marley - as she investigates, she puts herself in danger and discovers she didn't really know Marley at all. What was Marley involved in? Who are the men coming after Katie? Will she uncover the truth before its too late?
An enjoyable read.
#PlaytheFool #NetGalley

Pure chaos - at no point did I know where this mystery was going and whether it would actually get solved. But actually lighthearted and fun too? And some good mental health rep. Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the advance copy.

Early reviews for 'Play the Fool' by Lina Chern are a little mixed. With this eye-catching cover, the fact that I love a good mystery AND read tarot myself I'm choosing to reserve judgement. Frankly the blurb sounds fantastic. Thanks to Kathleen Quinlan, Assistant Director of Marketing at Random House for always offering me THE BEST book options. Stay tuned for my full review closer to the release date.

This was a good cozy mystery read for people who like tarot. It has a uniqure premise. This is A solid debut.

I loved this book! The characters were an interesting mix, with added depth as the book went along. My absolute favorite was Katie; although, she was a bit of a hot mess, she was also fun and I thoroughly appreciated the way she thought in Tarot cards.

The mystery was well told and everything was wrapped up neatly by the end. I'd love it if the author wrote more books about the characters.

I loved how this book started. I was hooked on the mystery. However, I did start to lose interest around half way through. I think there were too many elements going on at once. I didn't like the will they won't they of Katie and Jamie. I wish there was more tarot card reading.

I loved the tarot card part. That is what really endeared me to this story because I love anything with tarot cards in it! That was a lot of fun. Unfortunately I couldn't get too into the mystery itself. I think I just like my mysteries a little darker and deeper. This would be good for someone looking for a light, cozy read.

A cozy mystery with tarot!

Katie works a dead end job at the mall reading tarot in a gift store, too uninspired to reach for anything better. But when her only real mall friend goes missing and her ex comes in for a reading, Katie only “sees” tragedy and she’s determined to work out justice for her friend… or maybe die trying.

I loved Katie and her voice and the way she could see situations and people in terms of tarot cards. I liked getting the explanation for what each card represents and how it fit each scenario. I also really liked her interactions with her brother. She felt genuine and messy and relatable. I wasn’t a huge fan of Jamie as he never felt fully fleshed out. His banter with Katie was laugh out loud funny tho, so I give him a pass :)

The pace fit a cozy mystery really well. I enjoyed the haphazard sleuthing and the well executed plot that was rife with red herrings and twists and turns. I would definitely read a second book in this series!

Thank you to the publisher for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Content Warning: violence

I’m not a big fan of mystery books – it’s usually a hit or miss for me because if the story is slow and drags I will lose interest fast. But I wanted to take a chance on this one because of the cool cover and the whole tarot card reading. Here is what I thought:

+ I was pleasantly surprised with how much this story captured my attention. Katie is an under achiever and so good at it but I didn’t really feel sorry for her because she was quirky, she still tried to live on her own even if it was a dump, she loves her brother a lot (I love Owen!) and I love their connection and she was genuinely nice to people even if she sort of knew how to lie to them when card reading.

+ I like when Katie tries to find her friend’s killer and befriends a cop who has a past – he’s hard to read which is not normal for her, but I like their friendship a lot. Is there a romance brewing between them? I don’t know because it stays in the friend zone but I like that they get to know each other and have great banter. They need one another but the romance and feelings are not the focus in this book.

+ I enjoyed the twists in the story. I went along for the ride and was really interested to know how Marley (the dead friend) died and how everything fit in the puzzle. I was entertained until the very end!

~ Katie is kind of lost, she goes from job to job and she is a tarot reader but the story only has her do one major reading. I kind of wanted to see her do more because I find tarot reading fascinating and just wanted to see more of it in the story. I liked how she read people in her mind upon meeting them though.

~ Katie herself isn’t a cop but after the “bad guys” first start following her and warning her – I would have thought they (Jaime and the cops) would be more vigilant about protecting her. Also I was wondering why if the bad guys were so bad, they just didn’t kidnap Katie and rip that necklace off her. She wore on her person for awhile – so I thought those guys showed a lot of restraint and was expecting them to do worse to her.

Why you should read it:
*entertaining whodunit story about an under-achiever who gets caught in the middle of a bad situation
*love Katie’s relationship with Owen and her growing friendship with Jamie
*fun twist and turns

Why you might not want to read it:
*I like it because it was fun for me but I’m not usually a mystery lover. Most mysteries that people love – I find boring, so my judgment of this book might be way off for someone who already loves reading mysteries. Basically – take my review with a grain of salt if you are a die-hard mystery fan.

My Thoughts:

I really enjoyed this one more than I thought I would! I love Katie’s quirky, chaotic, messy character, even though her living conditions stressed me out. I love her relationship with her brother Owen and her growing relationship with Jamie, the cop with a traumatic past. And overall I had fun trying to guess who killed Marley and seeing where the story went – which was into a place I didn’t even expect. My minor issues with the book only came with me wanting more tarot reading in the story since Katie is a tarot reader. Other than that I thought for someone who doesn’t love mysteries, this was a fun read.

2.5 stars rounded up.

Play the Fool by Lina Chern is described as a cozy mystery, but I don't read a lot of thriller and mystery novels to know the difference between regular mysteries versus cozy mysteries. Maybe because it feels low stakes? Maybe because there is some dry humor and somewhat quirky characters? I'm not entirely sure, but Play the Fool didn't quite have what I hoped it would have. It was: fast-paced and action-packed but it was also predictable, a little far-fetched and unrealistic. I didn't believe in the "best friend" relationship or the love interest plot lines. I saw the humor, but it didn't really work for me. The "I'm a mess" main character trope was fine, and I enjoyed that she was a tarot card reader. It added intrigue and uniqueness, but overall, this book just didn't deliver what I hoped it would.

Maybe for fans of mysteries and thrillers, it will hit differently!

This book had an interesting premise but the execution was not very smooth. The characters including the protagonist/narrator were underdeveloped and difficult to be invested in, and the twists and turns of the plot were pretty convoluted. I liked the fast pace of the story, it felt like there was always something important happening but there weren’t very many instances where I was truly interested in the progression of the story or the protagonist’s personal development.