The worst tarot books you have come across

stella01904

MM ~ This won't earn me any popularity since Brian WIlliams is very respected, but I didn't like his Minchiate deck OR book. The deck looks like it was done with Bic Bananas and the book was fluffy. I love my Minchiate Etruria and I bought the Brian Williams set only to get more information. Etruria shows the Fool as a real idiot, holding a small child by the arm getting ready to hit him, while an older boy is sneaking up behind him, ready to clock him but good! This is life, this is the real stuff. The Williams deck shows the Fool as a sort of clown figure entertaining the happy children dancing around him. And the book gives a similar interp, for this and all the others, everything's lost its edge completely. It reads like a Hallmark card. Ack. Give me Sasha Fenton any day! BB, Stella

bassetized

RedMaple said:
Poppy Palin's book that goes with her Wild Spirit deck really irritated me. Very condescending. Only read a page or two and almost threw it across the room.

I absolutely agree with you about the book for Waking the Wild Spirit. The deck is gorgeous but the book is the worst. The idea of writing in first person for every card was iffy to begin with, and then the condescending, lecturing tone....I was like you--two pages and I wanted to flush it down the toilet (and I'm very respectful of books). I think I would agree with lots of her political and environmental ideas and I couldn't stand it--I can't imagine it would change the minds of any who disagree.

Anyway, I stuck the book on a back shelf and the deck and I get on fine.

--bassetized

Adjustment

Auroramyst said:
I'm sure some will disagree, but for me, Tarot Made Easy, by Nancy Garen, just didn't work. It's one of those books that made me think, "OMG, I'll NEVER learn this in a zillion years!"

If you're looking for something specific ("How does this card pertain to my job search?"), then it can certainly be helpful, but it is NOT a book to make learning the tarot "easy," as its name implies. It's more a book for those who DON'T want to learn the tarot but still want to be able to do readings for themselves.

I've read, on another forum, that there are mistakes in the astrological connections in this book, too. I haven't confirmed that myself.

I agree with you, this book is no very good if you want to learn Tarot.

Alta

Someone else mentioned the Collins Gem Guide to Tarot. I should have read a few pages in the store. It has TdM images, and I thought, "Actually something in English on TdM". Then I get home and they used RWS meanings for TdM.

Cerulean

...Sasha Fenton any day! BB, Stella

...No offense...her books are easy reads and full of common sence. They seem to have been reprinted in different editions. I got the feeling she went into the business at a time or place where someone felt safe to give their residence telephone numbers as business lines and had a room set up in her house.

I once bought a used book of hers that was illustrated with the Prediction Tarot--I decided that I didn't want that old book or deck, so exchanged/traded them last year.

But it's funny to me when I saw the Minchiate comments--I have the book by Williams and his survey method of period designs and discussions are fine with me. I kept the Renaissance Tarot and Minchiate books for reference and discarded my Sasha Fenton books.

But if your collection spans a lot of European decks, the updated Paul Huson's
"Mystical Origins of the Tarot" gives a fun and broad spectrum of 500 years of tarot history and line drawings to boot, especially in the Fool discussion. I noticed an online link that uses this as a reference.
...
Paul Huson, in his new book, The Mystical Origins of the Tarot, gives a useful listing of the meanings for each card according to the earliest works on cartomancy, from 1750, to A. E. Waite’s descriptions for his famous Rider deck in 1910. For the Fool card, almost all of these involve such concepts as “folly,” or “madness.” Only one shows anything like our modern view, and that is Waite, but not in his writing for the Rider deck (or at least not in the divinatory meanings he gives for the Rider). In his Manual of Cartomancy, published under the pseudonym “Grand Orient,” he describes the Fool as “...the consummation of everything, when that which began his initiation at zero attains the term of all numeration and existence. This card passes through all the numbered cards and is changed in each, as the natural man passes through worlds of lesser experience, worlds of successive attainment." (from 1889, quoted in Paul Huson's Mystical Origins of the Tarot, 2004).

http://www.themetaarts.com/pages/rachel1.html

Cerulean

hdarpini

Tarot Tips

hdarpini said:
Oops, I just bought this book ["Tarot Tips" from the Llewellyn series] from Amazon, based on the review it got and my own preview of its table of contents and the first couple of "tips." Well, we'll see. Maybe it will be more useful to me since I'm a Tarot neophyte.

I should have taken the advice of the original post I was responding to and canceled my order. This book is a mishmash of information that is only negligibly useful. Some of the information I would even categorize as whacked-out.

Llewellyn puts out some great books (e.g., "The Complete Book of Tarot Reversals") so I guess they're entitled to a clunker once in a while. Who knows, maybe some people do find this book useful. As for me, I'll be selling this baby on eBay, along with my other least-favorite book, "Tarot Card Combinations" by Dorothy Kelly.

The latter book does contain some useful ancillary information, but the bulk of the book, which deals with card combinations themselves, was disappointing. I was expecting the author to provide an approach and methodology to interpreting combinations, much like Mary Greer does in her book on reversals, rather than just an endless procession of of combinations and their supposed meanings (in keyworks no less, a method I find useless). I imagine that reading card combinations is much like reading individual cards: the meaning you give them is more a blend of others' interpretations and your own intuition rather than a rigid set of keywords to learn by rote. In terms of this perception of card combinations, this book fails.

If you'd like to make up your own mind about these books, check out my posting on eBay in a few days.

Hal

baba-prague

CeruleanBut it's funny to me when I saw the Minchiate comments--I have the book by Williams and his survey method of period designs and discussions are fine with me. I kept the Renaissance Tarot and Minchiate books for reference and discarded my Sasha Fenton books. Cerulean[/QUOTE said:
It's interesting, I also found the Minchiate book good for reference - but then again, I didn't use it at all for the tarot interpretations, only for the historical and iconographic information - so maybe that accounts for the difference in perception?

Little Baron

Marion said:
Someone else mentioned the Collins Gem Guide to Tarot. I should have read a few pages in the store. It has TdM images, and I thought, "Actually something in English on TdM". Then I get home and they used RWS meanings for TdM.

Marion, that is so irritating, isn't it? It drives me mad. I also looked at that book, then flicked through quickly for the more explicit meanings of the RWS (they were there) and put it back on the shelf. It is like there is little knowledge around the differences, or little care from the writers/publishers that they are using the meanings of one deck with the illustrations of another. The same thing happens in 'Life Planner' by Lady Lorelei. From what I can see, her interpretations and ideas are all RWS based, but she uses the cards of the 'Classic' (like the Soprafino) to illustrate it. Since there are, to my knowledge, no books in English about the Marseilles, I suppose that any of those books are none of those books would equally be a good choice, lol. I would say anyone is better off reading here. The best books are the ones that come with decks - Robert M.Places 'Buddha Tarot' accompanying book is a good example and nobody can talk you round his deck better than him.

LB

stella01904

Tara Deck said:
I agree with you, this book is no very good if you want to learn Tarot.

MM ~ I LIKE "Tarot Made Easy"! The point is not to memorise all that stuff she wrote, but to try to figure out her reasoning, how she got what she did! Which is an intersesting and helpful exercise. HER mistake is not telling you this! She wants you depending on the book, apparently .

Bad girl! Instructing people to look up meanings in books! Shame on you, Nancy! BB, Stella

stella01904

Cerulean said:
...No offense...her books are easy reads and full of common sence. They seem to have been reprinted in different editions. I got the feeling she went into the business at a time or place where someone felt safe to give their residence telephone numbers as business lines and had a room set up in her house.

MM ~ Exactly! She's Old School.

But it's funny to me when I saw the Minchiate comments--I have the book by Williams and his survey method of period designs and discussions are fine with me. I kept the Renaissance Tarot and Minchiate books for reference and discarded my Sasha Fenton books.

And to each his own! Williams only seems to go back as far as the renaissance. I cut my Italian Studies teeth on Charles Godfrey Leland, I'm rabid for the quaint and curious. I was disappointed with Williams.

But if your collection spans a lot of European decks, the updated Paul Huson's
"Mystical Origins of the Tarot" gives a fun and broad spectrum of 500 years of tarot history and line drawings to boot, especially in the Fool discussion. I noticed an online link that uses this as a reference.
.

Thanks, I'll look for that! I'm also interested in the European non-Tarot oracle decks, when they split off, etc. - this might be helpful!

For the Fool card, almost all of these involve such concepts as “folly,” or “madness.” Only one shows anything like our modern view,

Most of the time a fool is just a fool! Sometimes he's a holy fool - it's said that "God watches out for fools, drunks, and little kids". But the Williams Fool was neither. He should have just drawn Barney the Purple Dinosaur. Happy Happy Joy Joy and no cliff, no mace, no dog exposing his butt.

In his Manual of Cartomancy, published under the pseudonym “Grand Orient,” he describes the Fool as “...the consummation of everything, when that which began his initiation at zero attains the term of all numeration and existence. This card passes through all the numbered cards and is changed in each, as the natural man passes through worlds of lesser experience, worlds of successive attainment." (from 1889, quoted in Paul Huson's Mystical Origins of the Tarot, 2004).

In "The Hero's Journey", Joseph Campbell looked at a Marseilles deck and placed the Fool after the World, also. Interesting! BB, Stella

The worst tarot books you have come across

stella01904

bassetized

Adjustment

Alta

Cerulean

hdarpini

baba-prague

Little Baron

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