An intensely focused and dense analysis that will only appeal to those already well versed in tarot reading.
Van Waes offers a deep-dive into the process of tarot card reading, making the case for shifting away from traditional interpretations.
This tarot reading guide is based on the 78 cards from the Major and Minor Arcana, as well as the two additional positions of “Truth” and “Intuition” that the author adapted from a different source. Traditional approaches to tarot reading usually focus on “associative logic,” with readers using image association and symbol interpretation, but Van Waes finds this approach limiting. Instead, he focuses on an “intuitive approach” to minimize the arbitrariness of the process. He notes that there are no “good” or “bad” cards, just “fact-targeted” descriptions to help develop understanding. The first section of the book provides a fairly straightforward description of each card alongside its corresponding picture. The latter portions delve into more complex discussions of tarot reading, addressing topics such as the various combinations that can be achieved through the relationships between the three Arcana and the 32 types of intelligences that can help individuals further develop their unique talents. Corresponding diagrams become increasingly complicated, with various arrows and numbers crisscrossing over themselves and requiring intense concentration from the reader. Despite the subtitle claiming that this is “An Introduction to the Triune World of the Three Arcana,” there is nothing introductory about this guide; even those who are familiar with tarot reading may soon find themselves on shaky ground (“The twenty-one general stances are now given the neutral position that is required in the sort of situation where each phase in the cycle refers to a similar phase within the four sensory bodies. This is represented as 4 x (4+4), or 32 places that relate to each other and are enriched by a fully nourished consciousness…”). The writing style, while fairly direct, more closely resembles that of an academic textbook than a handbook for casual readers.
An intensely focused and dense analysis that will only appeal to those already well versed in tarot reading.Pub Date: May 11, 2023
ISBN: 9781698714615
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Trafford
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A pleasure for fans of old-school historical narratives.
Avuncular observations on matters historical from the late popularizer of the past.
McCullough made a fine career of storytelling his way through past events and the great men (and occasional woman) of long-ago American history. In that regard, to say nothing of his eschewing modern technology in favor of the typewriter (“I love the way the bell rings every time I swing the carriage lever”), he might be thought of as belonging to a past age himself. In this set of occasional pieces, including various speeches and genial essays on what to read and how to write, he strikes a strong tone as an old-fashioned moralist: “Indifference to history isn’t just ignorant, it’s rude,” he thunders. “It’s a form of ingratitude.” There are some charming reminiscences in here. One concerns cajoling his way into a meeting with Arthur Schlesinger in order to pitch a speech to presidential candidate John F. Kennedy: Where Richard Nixon “has no character and no convictions,” he opined, Kennedy “is appealing to our best instincts.” McCullough allows that it wasn’t the strongest of ideas, but Schlesinger told him to write up a speech anyway, and when it got to Kennedy, “he gave a speech in which there was one paragraph that had once sentence written by me.” Some of McCullough’s appreciations here are of writers who are not much read these days, such as Herman Wouk and Paul Horgan; a long piece concerns a president who’s been largely lost in the shuffle too, Harry Truman, whose decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan McCullough defends. At his best here, McCullough uses history as a way to orient thinking about the present, and with luck to good ends: “I am a short-range pessimist and a long-range optimist. I sincerely believe that we may be on the way to a very different and far better time.”
A pleasure for fans of old-school historical narratives.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781668098998
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
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