I received this as an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

The FMC is incredibly imperfect, and there were so many times you wanted to 🤦‍♀️ or shake her just a little bit, but I think that's what makes her relatable.

A tarot police consultant is a new one for me, but I enjoyed it! I liked her perspective and how easily she could shift gears but keep her eyes on solving the murder.

Thank you to @penguinrandomhouse for my #gifted copy.

Katie True is working a dead end Job and is kind of a mess but she’s okay with it! She finally makes a friend Marley who just gets her and she is so happy. Until shes reading Tarrot cards for a disheveled customer and finds out something happened to her friend! And now she has to get involved!

This book was a lot of fun! I loved the MC Katie. Her tarrot reading was so interesting, as she’s in a situation or talking to someone the cards pop up in her mind! This sometimes helps her in her precarious situations. The side characters Jamie and Owen bring so much more to the story too! There is special needs representation that I felt was done so well.
It had a twist I didn’t see and I enjoy that. It was just a wild ride of being reckless, finding yourself, friendship family and some bad guys!

In Play the Fool, Katie works as a Tarot reader in a mall with her best friend Marley. One day Katie is giving a reading to a customer. She gets some weird vibes and decides to go through his phone while he is in the restroom. While going through his phone, she finds a photo of her Marley dead! She goes to the police and an officer named Jamie helps her investigate this mystery and uncover the secrets.

This book is being touted as a mystery-thriller, but after finishing it; I’m saying it felt more like a “cozy mystery” than a thriller. I say that because it has a really comfortable energy to it, and it goes down easy, so it holds your interest and makes you want to keep reading. Yet it lacks a lot of the grit that I have come to associate with thrillers. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing necessarily but just be prepared for what it really is.

I have mixed feelings about this book. It is a strong debut novel and I wish the author all the best. I enjoyed our main character Katie, with her cynical and quirky vibes, as a tarot reader myself I enjoyed that aspect of it as well. However, I feel the book had a hard time deciding what it wanted to be: A cozy mystery? Romance? Coming of age? I finally decided to call it a cozy mystery and I did enjoy reading it. I was contacted by the publisher to read this, and I am so grateful for the opportunity to read this book before its publication date. I would recommend this book to those who love their mysteries cozy but not too scary and strong female protagonists. Katie is very brave and also a bit crazy which can get her into some bad spots sometimes! I say a solid 3 out of 5 stars!

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine. Play the Fool will be released on March 28th, 2023.

Play the Fool drew me in with it's pretty cover. Being Wiccan, the Tarot drew me in and the synopsis got me hooked. This sounded like it would be right up my alley. And it was, for the first 30 or 40% of the book. After that it kind of felt like I tripped while running downhill, when you get into an awful downward slide and can't stop yourself until you hit rock bottom. On top of not much really happening besides the main character being stupid, there were times where it went back in the past and then back to the present, with no warning. It left me confused when we were and what had happened. This book really ended up going flat for me, when I wished it would be perfect.

Play the Fool is a debut novel from Lina Chem and it was a super fast-paced thriller with a few moments where I laughed out loud.

First Impressions:
I loved the cover. The colors and the glow of neon. I’ve always been interested in reading tarot and I loved the descriptions of the MC’s mind as she categorized people based on the cards.

I can’t say I loved the main character, Katie True, sometimes she frustrated me and I was internally lecturing her throughout the book. But she was a good anti hero and by the end I was rooting for her.

Lots of action, seedy crime syndicates, people not who they seemed and even a touch of romance (but not in an overtly annoying way) the good type of romance.

Wonderful first book and I’ll be checking out others that this author releases.

Katie has been in a rut for sometime not sure of what to do with her life. Her latest mall job selling trinkets is the usual boring work until one day, manning the register, she stumbles into a murder mystery. And the person murdered is her best friend. With that starts a series of events that includes snooping, getting mixed up with the police, connecting clues, running from trouble, being threatened and a whole lot of chaos getting interjected into her ho-hum life. Does she truly know her friend? Will she find her killer?

This was a quick, enjoyable novel. The premise of our protagonist being a card reader added a nice twist to the plot line and character building. It was interesting to see how she constantly reads people and builds pictures of situations. Also how she sees herself and reads herself in the same manner. The plot did a good job of keeping you on your toes from one clue drop to the next. Katie is a lovable but messed up character who you are constantly rooting for. I recommend this to anyone who wants a light murder mystery. 5 stars.

Review based on a digital Uncorrected Proof provided by Random House Publishing Group and NetGalley. Thank you!

This was such a fun murder mystery! Katie True works at Firebird Imports, a Russian tchotchke boutique in the suburbs of Chicago. Her failed attempt at adulting as led her from one dead-end job to another. When a man bleeding from a head wound comes in, Katie offers to give him a tarot reading (something she's very good at) partially just so she can figure out what is going on with him. When he is momentarily distracted, she sneaks a glance at his phone for intel and finds a photo of her best friend, shot through the head. Um, what? Katie very quickly gets embroiled in the mystery of Marley and what happened to her. With some help from her new cop friend, Jamie Roth, Katie may even help take out a crime syndicate!

Special thanks to NetGalley and Bantam for this e-arc.*

Thank you for a copy of this novel for an honest review.

I wanted to love this novel more than I did. I loved the whole idea of the Tarot cards and even tho I pushed myself to finish the book , the ending felt completely flat for me.

*My review will be posted on Instagram within two weeks of the release date (slated for 3/14/23); this review will be updated with the appropriate links once live. -- ETA updated links on 3/14/23.

This one was a ✨WILD RIDE✨ Murder mystery meets romance meets a dash of magic... PLUS tarot cards?! I was all in with the description, and I was all in with the book as a whole. The tarot cards were such a unique addition and fun spin, and really added something special and different to the story as a whole.

It was a REALLY fast read, I got lost in the book so easily and finished it really quickly. However, it did seem somewhat formulaic and predictable at a certain point; it started off so, so strong and slowly lost steam in the second half.

But, I think this will be a winner for fans of Ninth House and/or Book of Night. While not as fantasy-forward as these two, I think these readers will thoroughly enjoy the story.

Thank you to #NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Bantam for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I received a digital advance reader’s copy of Play the Fool by Lina Chern via NetGalley. Play the Fool is scheduled for release on March 28, 2023.

Play the Fool follows Katie, a woman who has failed at adulting on her own and is now living near her parents, working at a glorified souvenir shop in the mall. The only bright spot for Katie is Marley, a woman who works in a shop across the atrium that has befriended Katie and seems to see her as a real person. Katie’s world shifts when a man stumbles into her shop. Katie offers to read his cards, and in the midst of the reading sneaks a peek at his phone. She sees something she wishes she could unsee: a photo of Marley lying dead by a dumpster. Katie finds herself caught in the search for the real Marley and the person responsible for her death.

While the plot of this novel did ask me to suspend my disbelief a bit (I very much questioned the interactions Katie had with the local police department), it was close enough to believable to keep me reading. I did see a couple of the reveals coming, but there were other twists that I did not. As a whole, the story was enjoyable and engaging. There is a touch of romance in the novel, but the focus is clearly on Katie and the mystery she is trying to solve. At the end of the novel, I could imagine some of what was in Katie’s future, but like Katie looking in the cards, questions remained.

As a character, I loved Katie. She is the walking definition of a hot mess. Some disasters fell into her lap, but others were the result of her questionable choices. I found myself telling her not to do what she was doing, but at the same time believing that is exactly what she would do. Even her most outlandish decisions were in keeping with her character. Around Katie, we have a variety of police officers, bad guys, and troublesome family. With Katie, we gain insight into each of them, finding them to be more than they were at first glance.

Overall, Play the Fool was a delightful, light-hearted mystery featuring a lovely mess of a main character.

Katie feels like a failure but has pretty much accepted that this is her life: a series of dead-end jobs and continuing to disappoint her parents for the rest of her life. But when a guy stumbles into the shop where she works looking a mess, she offers to do a tarot reading for him and stumbles across a picture on his phone that of her friend Marley, dead. Marley is everything Katie feels she isn't and she isn't going to rest until she finds out what happened to the her, even as her amateur sleuthing puts her in the crosshairs of some seriously dangerous people.

Early in my reading journey with this book I thought "this is a book with an identity crisis." It seemed like it wanted to be a crime novel and a cozy mystery and maybe even a little bit of a rom-com and couldn't decide what to be. The protagonist made some decisions that don't track as plausible, even in a cozy, and I was having a hard time suspending my disbelief. BUT. I kept reading. And once I accepted that this novel is its own kind of mystery, with a protagonist who makes some seriously bad choices (to often hilarious effect), I found myself really enjoying it. Yes, there is some incomplete character development in secondary characters, but those characters are interesting enough as they are that I want to know more about them. As in, please write another book (or books) that explores Joey's art issues and Owen's neurodivergence and follows up on what happens when Katie opens a business in fortune telling and delves into Jamie's adjustment to suburban policing. As much as I struggled with getting into the book, I want to know what happens to these people next.

Thank you to Random House Publishing and NetGalley for the opportunity to read Play the Fool early in exchange for an honest review.

4 stars / This review will be posted on goodreads.com today.

Brilliantly creative and funny. A hapless young woman struggling to find her place in the world, finds herself enmeshed in a murder mystery. Katie works at a Russian import place in the dying old mall in her town. Across the way is a shop where Marley works. They meet up outside in the courtyard and become an unlikely pair of friends.

When Marley goes missing, Katie gets wrapped up in trying to find out what exactly happened to Marley. Along the way she befriends one cop, enrages another, and finds out what she’s made of, and what she’s made for. Katie is a mess, but in nothing but a good way. So unlike her siblings, Owen, who struggles a bit with reality even though he’s a brilliant grad student, and Jessie, her real estate sister. Katie is the black sheep, but Marley helps her to figure out what she’s good at and how to keep at it.

Really cute story with plenty of mystery and misadventures for Katie, I loved reading this one. Very well done and fun story. Definitely recommend.

"a cynical tarot card reader"...this hooked me immediately and I was so entertained.
This was a great story, one that provided entertainment and an escape.

This was fun, enjoyable and different (in a good way).

I gave this book a few shots, the premise sounded right up my alley, but I had a hard time getting into the writing style. There was nothing wrong with it, just didn’t jive with me.

This was a pretty good debut novel. I thought the writing was good, although the story itself was hard to believe at times. I liked the humor but there were a few moments it went too far. I didn’t think the mystery was that mysterious, but it was a wild and bumpy ride. I loved the tarot card imagery and the fact that the main character even envisioned cards that fit as she spoke with people. It was really creative and very interesting. Katie True is a middle child who manages to squeak through life while the rest of her family reaches big and wonders what is wrong with her. She works at a dead end job in a mall and wishes she could have her own business reading tarot cards. When she suddenly becomes the only one sure her only friend is dead and amazingly finds a cop willing to unofficially work the case with her, her life takes on a whole new direction as they try to find out what happened to Marley.

Play the Fool is about a "nobody" girl named Katie, working a dead-end mall job, turned undercover detective, in this mystery debut, when she befriends another "nobody" named Marley, a girl from her past who also happens to be working a dead-end mall job at a store next door. This story takes off almost immediately when an unexpected man stumbles into her shop, with a bloody wound on his forehead. Katie offers to do a tarot card reading, but what starts as a tarot reading for fun, turns into a series of events that she definitely didn't expect to foresee in her future.

From the beginning I didn't feel the main protagonist was a believable character. Her decisions made for a decent story, but I had a hard time believing that she would sacrifice her own safety and well-being, without so much as a second thought, for a girl she barely knew that she ate fried rice with during break hours.

As for the antagonists, there were a couple; But they weren't a extremely threatening presence within the story. One was a lover scorned, and the other was just a bad guy trying to get this money back, who happened to be related.

I think the author did a good job with this genre, though I felt it wasn't my cup of tea. It was well-written for other lovers of mystery, though I couldn't quite grasp how the tarot cards fit into the story. Aside from the title and the beginning when she reads the cards for the gentleman that stumbles in, which I felt very strongly was a scenario that would not happen in real life... I had to ask myself, "Would you read the cards for someone who stumbles into your place of work with a bloody headwound?" In all honesty, I wouldn't. BUT... As I mentioned prior, I think the author had reason for the protagonists' decisions, and it made for a fairly well-written mystery.

Playing the Fool was definitely not what I expected. Unfortunately, it will not be one I recommend to my fellow readers... But as I've come to see with any other book, I hope other readers will enjoy it, even if I didn't.

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group, and the author for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

3.5⭐️ Play the Fool is a fun debut mystery by Lina Chern. Katie Tue is stuck at a dead end job selling Russian knick knacks at a store in the mall. One night, a guy stumbles in with a gash on his forehead and she decides to pull out her tarot cards. That decision will lead her on a wild goose chase trying o find out who murdered her friend and fellow mall worker, Marley. What she uncovers will make Katie question everything she thought she knew about Marley and their friendship. play the Fool has some fun characters, a decent story, and a few twists and turns to keep the story moving.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance copy.

This is a slacker success story. I liked Katie’s love interest Jamie a lot, and didn’t mind how directionless Katie was. I loved how sweet she was to her neurodivergent brother Owen, and her dry sense of humor. The plot was a little slapstick in places (a female police officer covered in blue paint in a shed along with a painting of Nick Cave?) but it fit with the overall tone of the book. I loved the tarot theme throughout and almost felt like it could have been played up a little more. I would recommend this to mystery lovers who are good with a little bit of goth eccentricity.

Play the Fool is a unique mystery with a tarot-card reading amateur sleuth.

Katie True works at a store at the mall, selling cheap imported goods. She is a bit aimless, unlike the rest of her family. What she's really good at is reading tarot cards, or, more accurately, reading people and using the cards to help them. This particular day, a strange man lurches into her shop with a minor head wound. She offers to read his cards, and in doing so, sees his phone and the picture of a dead woman on it. But it isn't just any dead woman, it is her friend Marley, who works in a store across the mall from her.

Katie is a bit too curious, and follows the man from the mall to a house, where she sees Marley's things. She follows him in and hears him searching for something. The cops come, and don't catch him, but they find her hiding in the closet. The police officer, Jamie, is suspicious of her at first, but eventually starts investigating Marley's disappearance/death, even though there's no body or evidence that the picture Katie saw was real. Katie starts to wear Marley's necklace, and finds it brings her courage to be herself. She also starts getting visits from burglars and thugs who threaten her, thinking she has whatever Marley was hiding. Could it b the necklace they're searching for?

This book was exciting enough to keep my interest, but it wasn't my favorite. There wasn't enough joy and smart dialogue to make this book compare favorably with Dial A for Aunties or Finlay Donovan, but it also wasn't dark enough to be considered a thriller. It fell somewhere in the middle and it suffered for that. But it's not a bad book if you are looking for a different type of mystery.

Thanks to Netgalley for the advance copy of this book.

A light and enjoyable read. Katie is a quirky character, is good at reading Tarot cards but does not yet have regular clients. An entertaining story which read more like a cozy mystery to me.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advance copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.