Tarot, Tea, & Me - A Tarot Readers Community - The Tarot Forum

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Fantastic Menagerie Tarot
By Jewel

Published in March of 2006, The Fantastic Menagerie was the fourth Tarot deck published by Magic Realist Press (MRP).  It was published as a deck and book set.  If you have read any of the previous reviews I have written about MRP decks then you know I am a huge fan of their decks and books, and this one is no exception.  I will admit, when I purchased the deck it was more because it was created by Baba Studios than my interest in the art, and I will also confess that it took me some time to warm up to this deck.  In my desire to connect with it I chose The Fantastic Menagerie to complete both the Apprentice and Journeyman levels of “21 Ways to Read a Tarot Card” by Mary Greer, and worked with the deck for about a year and half solid.  Needless to say, by the time I completed the work, I was in love with it. 

As usual, Karen Mahoney and Alex Ukolov did their research...

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Shadowscapes Tarot
By Jewel

This is a deck I was chomping at the bit to get from watching images of it surface while it was in progress.  Published in 2010 by Llewellyn, Shadowscapes is one of the prettiest decks I have seen.  Stephanie began painting the deck in 2004, in her own words “Like the Fool, I stood on the precipice of this project, teetering on the edge of a vast unknown – … Each one [cards] bears the mark of my meditations as I wondered through a changing landscape of existence.”  The meditative work she did is reflected in the infinite details contained in the images.  A true to gift to the tarot world.

Stephanie Pui-Mun Law’s watercolor art is simply breathtaking.  There is a dreaminess and other worldliness to it that just draws me in and transports me to its magical landscape that flows like poetry.  Call it faerie or fantasy it is like walking in a dream.  Both Major and Minor Araca...

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The Alice Tarot
by Jewel

I am a confessed Baba Studios/Magic Realist Press (MRP) fan girl, and will never apologize for it.  Karen Mahoney and Alex Ukolov made a believer out of me with their previous decks, and just when I think they can't top what they have previously done, they managed to surprise me yet again with The Alice Tarot.  I know the deck is not new, it was originally published in 2014 and they are currently taking pre-orders for the re-release to come in March of 2019, but it is new to me and what a treat it is.  In my personal opinion it is the crown jewel of their fabulous decks.  From the fact that we have actual pictures of Alex as the Mad Hatter and his daughter as Alice, to the amazing costumes that were designed and created for the models photographed to create this deck.  Not to mention Alex’s artistic brilliance.  How he does what he does with the digital art to make people like me who are...