This deck-and-book set has a real interesting little story behind it.  I found this set at the local B. Dalton bookstore, in the bargain books rack, and literally the entire name of the set is Tarot.  I take the liberty here of calling it the Barnes and Noble tarot, because literally this set is published by Barnes and Noble, and the deck was specially commissioned by them, to be able to offer this set in their stores.

The deck is an attractively reworked deck inspired largely by the Marseille tarot in its design layout; using pips and courts for the Minors.  The book in the set is one of those hardbound, full-color glossy paged gift type books, the type that normally cost ten dollars or so on their own.  The box the set comes in is a very nicely packaged shoebox style with a window in the lid so you can see the smaller box the deck is in, and the deck and book are held in place by a plastic tray inside the box.

The artistic design of the cards is actually rather pleasant to look at, and the symbolism is, at least in the Major Arcana, largely intact.  There does seem to be, even in the presence of pip cards, a decent amount of symbolism in the Minor Arcana as well.  I recognized several pictures which looked really strongly like they were taken from the Rider-Waite deck; what is strange is that they weren't used for their corresponding card in this deck.

An example of this is, the picture of the four rods with the wreaths at the top in the Rider-Waite as the Four of Wands, is present in this deck as the Six of Wands..... obviously changed slightly but also very obviously the same design.  Another example is the woman in the Rider-Waite Nine of Pentacles appears in this deck as the Queen of Wands, and it is really obvious that it is the same woman, when you compare them side-by-side.

This does not in any way detract from the deck, and in fact, it is a really nice set overall.  Anyone who works with the Marseille will probably be comfortable with this one as well, and I don't see any reason anyone else won't enjoy it.  The cards themselves are a lot thinner than usual, so the deck has a really good light feel to it.  They aren't as flimsy as that sounds.  They shuffle and handle well and the edges are smooth and polished feeling.

I can easily recommend this deck-and-book set for any collector, anyone who works with classic Marseille-style decks, and it appears to be sufficiently laid out for a beginner as well.  At $9.95 for the set, it is obviously a real steal.  I imagine it can only be purchased in a Barnes and Noble Bookseller, or in any of their affiliate stores like B. Dalton.

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Review Copyright 1998 by Gina M. Pace