I knew this was going to be a "cute" deck the moment I first heard of it.  I've kind of been putting it off in favor of more "important" decks, but I finally got around to this one tonight and it's a real pleasure to look at.  The deck is primarily done in Italian, with card titles on a little banner in each picture.  Above the picture on each card is a "keyword" meaning, in Italian, with the translation in English underneath it.  There are card title translations in English, French, German and Spanish underneath the picture at the bottom of each card.

The artwork is done in a charming cartoon-like way, with cheerful, ruddy-faced little gnomes acting out the various poses of the entire deck.  This basically depicts life in general in the world of gnomes.  All of the cards have keyword meanings like "The Work" and "The Disagreement" with the exception of the Major Arcana, which appear to have the names of the Gnomes themselves.  These may be gnomish deities, there is no explanation of them.

There is no enclosed booklet, but at the end of the deck is a series of about 18 cards which are printed in five languages with directions on how to read the cards in one particular layout, and what each card means.  Some of these meanings are close to the traditional, others veer wildly off course.

The deck itself is slightly shorter and narrower than a standard deck, but handles and shuffles very comfortably.  The stiffness of the cards goes away quickly.  The suits are only named in the court cards, as Spades, Batons, Coins and Cups.

Overall I'd say this is a nice deck for a collector, and probably useable as a deck for readings, but if you have trained with traditional meanings you may find the transition a bit difficult.  I do like it though.

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Review Copyright 1998 by Gina M. Pace