Fans pick 100 books like The Creative Tarot

By Jessa Crispin,

Here are 100 books that The Creative Tarot fans have personally recommended if you like The Creative Tarot. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Book cover of The Castle of Crossed Destinies

Tania Pryputniewicz Author Of Heart's Compass Tarot

From my list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a poet, tarot muse, and artist whose childhood experiences with vivid night-time dreams and a handful of years on a commune in the cornfields ignited my passion for exploring inner imagery. I read voraciously from science fiction to fairytales to channelings. I discovered tarot in my twenties, using it to read for others, mend my broken heart, and get squared away enough to apply to graduate school for poetry in the heartland at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Ever since, tarot is my favorite mirror for self-reflection. Author of two poetry collections, I wrote a workbook to help others apply the tarot in joyful, healing ways through writing and art.

Tania's book list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists

Tania Pryputniewicz Why did Tania love this book?

As a lover of fairytales, I love the premise of The Castle of Crossed Destinies and that tarot cards appear visually down the margins of the pages. Novelist Italo Calvino places us in two settings: a castle, and a tavern. Guests traveling through the woods arrive to discover they have lost their ability to speak so they use tarot cards to “show” their stories. The narrator translates those cards (reliably or unreliably—you decide). A tarot card grid appears for the stories in the Tavern of Crossed Destinies section of the book that lays out plot possibilities. I love the visual “chess” concept and that you can use tarot card layouts to plot tales, novels, or a series of poems. 

By Italo Calvino,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Castle of Crossed Destinies as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A group of travellers chance to meet, first in a castle, then a tavern. Their powers of speech are magically taken from them and instead they have only tarot cards with which to tell their stories. What follows is an exquisite interlinking of narratives, and a fantastic, surreal and chaotic history of all human consciousness.


Book cover of The Poet Tarot Guidebook

Tania Pryputniewicz Author Of Heart's Compass Tarot

From my list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a poet, tarot muse, and artist whose childhood experiences with vivid night-time dreams and a handful of years on a commune in the cornfields ignited my passion for exploring inner imagery. I read voraciously from science fiction to fairytales to channelings. I discovered tarot in my twenties, using it to read for others, mend my broken heart, and get squared away enough to apply to graduate school for poetry in the heartland at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Ever since, tarot is my favorite mirror for self-reflection. Author of two poetry collections, I wrote a workbook to help others apply the tarot in joyful, healing ways through writing and art.

Tania's book list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists

Tania Pryputniewicz Why did Tania love this book?

As a poet, I love the Poet Tarot, for which Two Sylvias Press matched Major Arcana and Court Cards with deceased British and American poets. The Guidebook offers a mini history lesson about each poet’s strengths and weaknesses, including psychological wellbeing, journey to publication, and sources of inspiration. Each chapter ends with suggested actions: “Remember and honor the inspirational women in your life,” (Gwendolyn Brooks as the Queen of Muses / Cups) and prompts: “Is there a project I’ve been afraid to undertake—why?” (ee cummings as The Fool). Taken collectively, the prompts provide a roadmap for a rich self-reflective inventory and the chance to write new poems based on the themes of each poet’s work. I love to use the exercises in the poetry workshops I teach.

By Two Sylvias Press,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Poet Tarot Guidebook as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Guidebook to accompany The Poet Tarot deck. Deck not included.


Book cover of Ancestral Tarot: Uncover Your Past and Chart Your Future

Tania Pryputniewicz Author Of Heart's Compass Tarot

From my list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a poet, tarot muse, and artist whose childhood experiences with vivid night-time dreams and a handful of years on a commune in the cornfields ignited my passion for exploring inner imagery. I read voraciously from science fiction to fairytales to channelings. I discovered tarot in my twenties, using it to read for others, mend my broken heart, and get squared away enough to apply to graduate school for poetry in the heartland at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Ever since, tarot is my favorite mirror for self-reflection. Author of two poetry collections, I wrote a workbook to help others apply the tarot in joyful, healing ways through writing and art.

Tania's book list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists

Tania Pryputniewicz Why did Tania love this book?

Because I love understanding the roots of my present by looking at my past, I loved using Nancy Hendrickson’s Ancestral Tarot exercises to begin a relationship with my own ancestors. Hendrickson defines types of ancestors (blood, place, and time) and suggests practical ways to connect. Journaling prompts encourage you to create a paper trail of your journey. Hendrickson gives us layouts and delves into tools (sigils, moon energy, pendulums runes, oracles). You can dive deep to look at patterns surrounding addiction, generational incarnations, DNA, and more. As soon as I brought this book into my home (while preparing to teach a class with it) I had a powerful and moving dream that connected me to a loving ancestor.

By Nancy Hendrickson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Ancestral Tarot as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A practical, hands-on guide for using tarot to connect with your ancestors and gain access to their insights for healing, self-protection, and personal powers.

With a tarot deck in hand, readers will learn how to identify and access ancestral gifts, messages, powers, protectors, and healers.

Tarot expert Nancy Hendrickson guides readers through the basics of finding recent ancestors, and navigating the confusing maze of DNA and ethnic heritage. As a longtime tarot enthusiast, she shows readers how to incorporate a metaphysical tool into a world of tradition.

Ancestral Tarot spreads are included in relevant chapters. Each chapter includes three journal…


If you love The Creative Tarot...

Ad

Book cover of Free Your Joy: The Twelve Keys to Sustainable Happiness

Free Your Joy By Lisa McCourt,

We all want peace. We all want a life of joy and meaning. We want to feel blissfully comfortable in our own skin, moving through the world with grace and ease. But how many of us are actively taking the steps to create such a life? 

In Free Your Joy…

Book cover of Journeying the Sixties: A Counterculture Tarot

Tania Pryputniewicz Author Of Heart's Compass Tarot

From my list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a poet, tarot muse, and artist whose childhood experiences with vivid night-time dreams and a handful of years on a commune in the cornfields ignited my passion for exploring inner imagery. I read voraciously from science fiction to fairytales to channelings. I discovered tarot in my twenties, using it to read for others, mend my broken heart, and get squared away enough to apply to graduate school for poetry in the heartland at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Ever since, tarot is my favorite mirror for self-reflection. Author of two poetry collections, I wrote a workbook to help others apply the tarot in joyful, healing ways through writing and art.

Tania's book list on tarot improvisation for writers and artists

Tania Pryputniewicz Why did Tania love this book?

Writer, photographer, and journalist William Cook Haigwood selected his own photos to create Journeying the Sixties: A Counterculture Tarot. The book helped me understand the context for my early childhood when my parents had an apartment in the Haight. Haigwood practically offers a graduate-level course in the Sixties by examining the major players, the opposing forces, and the gifts and wages of the unbridled idealism and enthusiasm characteristic for the times (love, religion, art, music, politics, law enforcement, war, drugs, feminism, poetry, revolution, and more). The Eight of Cups chapter looks at People’s Park in Berkeley; Mick Jagger represents the King of Pentacles; the Death card discussion explores Martin Luther King, Jr., Kennedy, and Vietnam. Haigwood’s interpretations make tarot’s archetypal energies relevant to the lessons of an entire generation. 

By William Cook Haigwood,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Journeying the Sixties as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Journalist and writer William Cook Haigwood offers a unique look at the Counterculture of the 1960s in this collection of historical essays and vintage photographs that uses the symbolism of the Tarot to describe and conceptualize the era’s critical cycles of experience. Journeying the Sixties: A Counterculture Tarot features photographs selected from thousands made by the author during more than 15 years of reporting and participation in what has come to be called “the 20th century’s longest decade.” Selected images from the period have been formatted as Tarot cards. Essays supporting the cards use the Fool’s Journey to extend a…


Book cover of Divination for Beginners: Reading the Past, Present & Future

Susan Levitt Author Of Introduction to Tarot

From my list on skills for the art of tarot card reading.

Why am I passionate about this?

I've always been interested in fortune telling, and how the mysteries of life are revealed. I was especially interested in ancient Greece and the oracle of Delphi. When I was 17, a neighbor in Chicago read my tarot cards. Everything the cards indicated came true! So I got a tarot deck and started playing around with the cards. When I moved to California 10 years later, people asked me to read their cards. I obliged, it was fun, and my tarot business was born. When asked to teach tarot, I started classes. The class notes became my book Introduction to Tarot.

Susan's book list on skills for the art of tarot card reading

Susan Levitt Why did Susan love this book?

Over the years, when I taught tarot classes, there were always a few students who were interested in the divination aspect of tarot, but tarot was just not the right oracle for them. For animal lovers, I recommended the simpler and more direct Medicine Cards: The Discovery of Power Through the Ways of Animals by Jamie Sam's and David Carson because animal totems resonated with them. 

I recall a student who was of Norwegian ancestry who found tarot overwhelming, but the right oracle for him was The Book of Runes by Ralph H. Bloom. Even if tarot is your path, it's interesting to know of the many forms of divination that can be available to everyone.

By Scott Cunningham,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Divination for Beginners as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Anyone can practice divination. You don't need to be psychic, or believe that a higher power controls the cards. Anyone can learn to predict the future using the methods described in this book. Learn how to choose the methods that works best for you, and ask the right questions so you get accurate answers. Discover the secrets of a wide variety of methods, from Tarot cards and the I Ching to crystal gazing, palmistry, and even reading signs and omens in the world around you.

The real value of divination is in planning and prevention. If you like the answers…


Book cover of Holistic Tarot: An Integrative Approach to Using Tarot for Personal Growth

Laura Perry Author Of The Minoan Tarot

From my list on to make Tarot seem less intimidating.

Why am I passionate about this?

I began reading Tarot in high school – or at least, trying to. Like most people, I was pretty intimidated starting out. It took several teachers, a stack of books, and a lot of years before I understood that Tarot cards are simply repositories for symbols of the human experience. That’s how they continue to be so popular: they speak to something deep within us all. It was only natural that my art endeavors and my passion for the ancient Minoans would eventually dovetail with my love of Tarot. The end result was The Minoan Tarot, which I’m delighted to share with you along with these excellent Tarot books.

Laura's book list on to make Tarot seem less intimidating

Laura Perry Why did Laura love this book?

If you’ve ever thought about using the Tarot for personal development instead of just divination, but didn’t know where to start, Holistic Tarot is the resource for you. Tarot cards are no substitute for a good therapist, but in this book, Benebell Wen shows you how to use the cards to better understand your emotions and desires and to help you remove blockages to your creativity and satisfaction with life. This is a structured and methodical approach that will give you practical results.

By Benebell Wen,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Holistic Tarot as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Designed for beginning as well as experienced tarot readers, Holistic Tarot offers a fresh and easy-to-follow approach to the use of the tarot deck for tapping into subconscious knowledge and creativity. The tarot deck has been used as a divination tool for more than two centuries; while the tarot is still most commonly thought of as "fortune telling," the true power of the tarot lies in its ability to channel a clear path for our deep intuition to shine through. Consulting the tarot can help clear creativity blockages, clarify ambitions, work through complex decisions, and make sense of emotions and…


If you love Jessa Crispin...

Ad

Book cover of Currently Away: How Two Disenchanted People Traveled the Great Loop for Nine Months and Returned to the Start, Energized and Optimistic

Currently Away By Bruce Tate,

The plan was insane. The trap seemed to snap shut on Bruce and Maggie Tate, an isolation forced on them by the pandemic and America's growing political factionalism. Something had to change.

Maggie's surprising answer: buy a boat, learn to pilot it, and embark on the Great Loop. With no…

Book cover of Red Tarot: A Decolonial Guide to Divinatory Literacy

Amy Torok and Risa Dickens Author Of Missing Witches Deck of Oracles: Feminist Ancestor Magic for Meditations, Divination, and Spellwork

From my list on understanding real modern witchcraft.

Why we are passionate about this?

We are Witches. Real Witches, doing real magic, casting spells, and weaving webs. We are Amy Torok and Risa Dickens–the co-creators of the Missing Witches project, researching what it means to be a Witch. Together, we have put out almost 300 podcast episodes and published two books and an oracle deck of cards: Missing Witches: Recovering True Histories Of Feminist Magic, New Moon Magic: 13 Anti-capitalist Tools for Resistance and Re-enchantment, and The Missing Witches Deck of Oracles: Feminist Ancestor Magic for Meditations, Divination and Spellwork. Our first book appeared on VICE Magazine’s list: The Best Books for Starting an Occult Library.

Amy and Risa's book list on understanding real modern witchcraft

Amy Torok and Risa Dickens Why did Amy and Risa love this book?

In this book, Christopher Marmalejo entranced us with a singular take on investigating tarot cards through a queer and Indigenous lens. Exploring cartomancy as a mirror to understand lived experience, Christopher brings to light a practice that is unafraid to confront, listen, critique, and unveil.

We love how Christopher’s personality shines through this thoroughly academic yet approachable description of tarot cards and their uses. Reading it filled us with hope for a future of liberation and ideas of how we can make that happen.

By Christopher Marmolejo,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Red Tarot as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Designed to be used with any deck, Red Tarot is a radical praxis and decolonized oracle that moves beyond self-help and divination to reclaim tarot for liberation, self-determination, and collective healing.

For readers of Postcolonial Astrology and Tarot for Change

Red Tarot speaks to anyone othered for their identity or ways of being or thinking—LGBTQIA2S+ and BIPOC folks in particular—presenting the tarot as a radical epistemology that shifts the authority of knowing into the hands of the people themselves.

Author Christopher Marmolejo frames literacy as key to liberation, and explores an understanding of tarot as critical literacy. They show how…


Book cover of The Tarot: History, Symbolism, & Divination

Kirsten Weiss Author Of The Mysteries of Tarot: A Work of the Imagination

From my list on how to read Tarot.

Why am I passionate about this?

When I joined the Peace Corps in the early nineties, I wasn’t allowed to take much luggage. I decided to bring a Tarot deck, figuring I’d finally have time to learn it while parked in an Estonian forest. That Tarot deck opened up a world of Renaissance mysticism and magic, and I’ve been hooked ever since. Tarot cards and readings feature prominently in many of my cozy mystery novels, not the least of which are the Tea and Tarot mysteries. Now my imaginary Tarot reader from that series, Hyperion Night, has recently written his own Tarot guidebook, The Mysteries of Tarot.

Kirsten's book list on how to read Tarot

Kirsten Weiss Why did Kirsten love this book?

Robert Place is my favorite Tarot historian and artist.

What I love about this book is that he writes it in such a way that his discussion of the history of the cards makes it easier to understand and remember their symbolism (always useful when you’re trying to read Tarot). It also has detailed descriptions of different spreads.

But to my mind, it’s just a fun, interesting read, and a book I’ve turned to many a time for research and reading purposes.

By Robert Place,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Tarot as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Tarot is one of the few books that cuts through conventional misperceptions to explore the Tarot deck as it really developed in the Middle Ages and Renaissance Europe-not, as some would suggest, in the far reaches of Egyp-tian antiquity. Mining the Hermetic, alchemical, and Neoplatonic influences behind the evolution of the deck, author Robert M. Place provides a historically grounded and compelling portrait of the Tarot's true origins, without overlooking the deck's mystical dimensions.

Indeed, Place uncommonly weds reliable historiography with a practical understanding of the intuitive help and divinatory guidance that the cards can bring. He presents techniques…


Book cover of The Way of Tarot: The Spiritual Teacher in the Cards

Peter Mark Adams Author Of The Game of Saturn: Decoding the Sola-Busca Tarocchi

From my list on the Esoteric Tarot.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been a tarot devotee since my early teens and have offered both training and divinatory sessions using the tarot. My book on the fifteenth-century tarot deck known as the Sola-Busca, The Game of Saturn, was nominated The Best Esoteric Book of the Year and was reviewed in two of the world’s leading academic journals. My non-fiction is published by Inner Traditions and Scarlet Imprint; literary prose and poetry by Corbel Stone Press and Paralibrum. My essays on energy healing appear in the peer-reviewed Paranthropology Journal and the Journal of Exceptional Experiences and Psychology as well as on my academia.edu page.

Peter's book list on the Esoteric Tarot

Peter Mark Adams Why did Peter love this book?

The famed filmmaker and esotericist, Alejandro Jodorowsky, has poured decades of profound spiritual and divinatory understanding into this text to create one of the most significant systems for using the cards as a divinatory tool. Based on the Tarot d’Marseilles - arguably the stylistic form that constitutes the tarot’s most fundamental iconography - the text includes a comprehensive training system that can be used to provide a foundation for professional divinatory work.

By Alexandro Jodorowsky, Marianne Costa,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Way of Tarot as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Alejandro Jodorowsky's profound study of the Tarot, which began in the early 1950s, reveals it to be far more than a simple divination device. The Tarot is first and foremost a powerful instrument of self-knowledge and a representation of the structure of the soul. The Way of Tarotshows that the entire deck is structured like a temple, or a mandala, which is both an image of the world and a representation of the divine. The authors use the sacred art of the original Marseille Tarot--created during a time of religious tolerance in the 11th century--to reconnect with the roots of…


If you love The Creative Tarot...

Ad

Book cover of Today Was A Good Day: A Collection of Essays From The Heart Of A Neurosurgeon

Today Was A Good Day By Edward Benzel,

My book is a collection of monthly Editor-in-Chief letters to the readership of World Neurosurgery, a journal that I edit. Each essay is short and sweet. The letters were written for neurosurgeons but have been re-edited so that they apply to all human beings. They cover topics such as leadership,…

Book cover of Histoire du tarot - Origines - Iconographie - Symbolisme

Vanessa Decort Author Of Sun and Moon Tarot

From my list on tarot and its many facets.

Why am I passionate about this?

Since I was a teenager, I have been attracted to astrology, Jungian psychology, synchronicity, symbolism, alchemy, and Jewish esotery. Someone gave me my first Tarot deck as a present. Since then I collect old and new decks from the entire world and created my own Sun and Moon TarotI continue to deepen my knowledge of tarot and all the systems associated with it. At times I focus more on the Sefiroth and Kabbalah. Sometimes I’m more interested in different ways of interpreting tarot. I've been illustrating Astrological Learning Cards for a while now, trying to better understand the different astrological archetypes and to make art.

Vanessa's book list on tarot and its many facets

Vanessa Decort Why did Vanessa love this book?

When you delve into different facets of the tarot, you come across quite a few different models or systems with different assignments of numbers, Hebrew letters, paths, astrological signs…which can be very confusing! I was quite confused myself when I was looking for the correspondence between the 4 Tarot ‘suits’ and those of a regular card game and find different contradictory correspondence with the pips of regular playing cards.

In a lecture, Isabelle explained to me very clearly with many examples how the 4 elements or colour symbols of the 4 suits in the regular card game originated and changed over the years and how they evolved in different systems of the tarot cards.

Isabelle Nadolny has done a lot of research working as a historian in the National Library of France and has compiled her findings, based on multiple references and documented resources, in this thick and very richly…

By Isabelle Nadolny,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Histoire du tarot - Origines - Iconographie - Symbolisme as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

L’histoire du tarot est fort méconnue. Si de nombreux livres abordent sa pratique ou ses significations, les rares publications historiques existantes circulent peu en dehors du cercle des chercheurs. Isabelle Nadolny entend y remédier en proposant au grand public un vaste panorama du tarot à travers les siècles. Cette présentation est assortie d’illustrations issues des fonds de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, de collections privées ou publiques, qui, pour certaines, sont publiées ici pour la première fois. Toute personne ayant prêté attention à ces cartes à la fois simples et mystérieuses est naturellement amenée à se poser quelques questions :…


Book cover of The Castle of Crossed Destinies
Book cover of The Poet Tarot Guidebook
Book cover of Ancestral Tarot: Uncover Your Past and Chart Your Future

Share your top 3 reads of 2024!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,592

readers submitted
so far, will you?

5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in divination, creativity, and tarot?

Divination 29 books
Creativity 144 books
Tarot 71 books