A review by alongreader
The History of Tarot Art: Demystifying the Art and Arcana, Deck by Deck by Holly Adams Easley, Esther Joy Archer

4.0

This is a beautiful, really well presented book. It's going to be in hardback, with coloured illustrations, and it's going to look absolutely amazing.

I'm a relatively recent tarot fan, and this was great as it gives an overview of the history of tarot in a light, fresh style, then shows a lot of the major decks of recent years. The cards chosen to show off give a great overview of each deck. Holly and Esther clearly deeply love and understand the art of tarot and of these decks.

I love the spreads at the back to try, and the fascinating evolution of tarot over the last four hundred years. I also really liked that it takes in the three main schools of tarot, rather than focusing mostly on one. It's great to see them all get their chance. The blurb says there's a cheat sheet on the card meanings; it may be a pullout in the physical book, but it isn't in my ebook proof version. I'm sure it's great though; the authors have shown such insight in other parts of the book.

I love this. My deck wishlist has just about doubled, and I'm going to be coming back to this for a while (or hopefully getting a physical copy to leaf through!) This is a great read if you have any interest in the history, or just want to look at the fantastic images. Gorgeous.