Gack!
Arrien's book is HIDEOUS. My advice? Avoid like syphilitic zombie IRS agents.
She will literally do nothing but misguide and confuse you. Some of her ideas about the deck are comical in ineptitude and self-involvement. Her subtitle is "Practical Applications of Ancient Visual Symbols" but her ideas are about as ancient as scented handiwipes. My favorite logical disconnect is that she wrote a dippy new age book about the Thoth without learning anything about the Thoth and then gives you her own mushy, psychologized "interpretative insights" and "growth symbols" by way of encouraging you to do the same. About as sensible as learning calculus by eating a cheeseburger. In essence, "Don't pay the slightest attention to the man who understood it and designed it, but pay attention to ME-ME-ME."
I'm not sure why people would want to ignore Crowley's writings on his own deck, but I know some people do. Still, if you want to create your own interpretations why would you want HERS?! Isn't the idea of intuitive meanings that you arrive at them
on your own? Which makes her book categorically pointless... like a car without seats, or a steering wheel, or an engine. This
book exists only to declare that you don't need to
read anything to interpret the deck.
I'm not even going to get into her butchering of archetypal psychology, but let's just say her readings of Jung are about as solid as her grasp of Crowley.
I cannot think of a single reason to recommend this book other than the fact that it's attractively designed and printed. The woman hasn't done the most basic homework and some of the out-and-out errors are mind-boggling. Leaving aside the belief that she should have done some (
ahem) research of her own, if she had even bothered to read Crowley ONCE she would have saved herself some howlers. Such was new age publishing in the 80s and the feel-good dumbing down of poor Carl Jung. Bizarre. I guess the book is good as a doorstop. Or mulch. But I'd feel bad for the flowers.
I know others are going to enter and give you the thumbsup, but I thought it was important enough to mention. Only my opinion, but do a search on her name and you'll find a legion of other Thoth users who agree.
Scion