A brilliantly illustrated tarot guide for the LGBTQ+ history lover.
Barber and Callaghan combine divination with LGBTQ+ history in this new tarot guide.
Tarot is more popular than ever before, as are themed novelty decks that reimagine the arcana as everything from Jungian archetypes to the cast of Star Trek. The authors make their contribution to the genre with this deck, which winks at the special place tarot has within the LGBTQ+ community while providing the querent with “moments to remember, moments of triumph, moments of reflection, but ultimately a celebration of those to be proud of, those who let the world know their truth, and who will never be forgotten because of it.” Beginning chronologically with pioneering 19th-century gay activist Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (the Ace of Swords) and sticking to subsequent figures who have since died, Barber and Callaghan assemble a pantheon of movers, shakers, and thinkers who have contributed in some way to modern queer culture. The reader will find many of the expected icons, including Harvey Milk as the Star (“hope shining through the darkness”), James Baldwin as Judgment (“coming to terms with the past in order to move forward”), Freddie Mercury as the Six of Wands (“the bridge between strength and love”), and Audre Lorde as the Queen of Swords (“extreme individualism and radical new ideas”). There are more obscure figures as well, and some cards are represented by groups or movements (the Stonewall rioters for Fortune, activist group ACT UP for Death). The authors express their desire not to “sugar-coat certain cards that, to us, are objectively, dispassionately, negative in their meaning,” and for this reason, the deck features a few “malicious, malignant, and unquestionably vile” figures, like prosecutor Roy Cohn (the Devil) and serial killer Aileen Wuornos (Ten of Swords). Each entry is accompanied by a page explaining both the meaning of card and the why the authors selected that specific figure to represent it.
The real star of the book may be Wischerath, whose full-color illustrations nod cleverly at the famous Rider-Waite Tarot images of Pamela Colman Smith while rendering their subjects in deep, velvety tones. Wischerath’s depictions of Walt Whitman (the Empress, enthroned on a cushioned bench with his arm draped around a pelican) and Alan Turing (the Hanged Man, suspended above a pool with nerve-like neon trees behind him) are especially striking. The initial delight of the book is flipping through the pages and discovering a number of famous personages whom the reader may not have known were queer (like Greta Garbo, Ma Rainey, and John Maynard Keynes). A secondary pleasure is learning about figures the reader has likely never heard of at all, like We’wha, the 19th-century Zuni craftswoman and two-spirit (or lhamana) who served as a cultural ambassador between her people and the white settlers of New Mexico. Whether readers are interested in conducting a proper reading (which the introduction explains how to complete) or are simply seeking a unique art book to adorn a coffee table, this tarot guide will provide hours of educational, queer-inspired illumination.
A brilliantly illustrated tarot guide for the LGBTQ+ history lover.Pub Date: July 22, 2024
ISBN: 9798218466770
Page Count: 170
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Nov. 21, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
A powerful reiteration of principles—and some fresh ideas—from the longest-serving independent in congressional history.
Another chapter in a long fight against inequality.
Building on his Fighting Oligarchy tour, which this year drew 280,000 people to rallies in red and blue states, Sanders amplifies his enduring campaign for economic fairness. The Vermont senator offers well-timed advice for combating corruption and issues a robust plea for national soul-searching. His argument rests on alarming data on the widening wealth gap’s impact on democracy. Bolstered by a 2010 Supreme Court decision that removed campaign finance limits, “100 billionaire families spent $2.6 billion” on 2024 elections. Sanders focuses on the Trump administration and congressional Republicans, describing their enactment of the “Big Beautiful Bill,” with its $1 trillion in tax breaks for the richest Americans and big social safety net cuts, as the “largest transfer of wealth” in living memory. But as is his custom, he spreads the blame, dinging Democrats for courting wealthy donors while ignoring the “needs and suffering” of the working class. “Trump filled the political vacuum that the Democrats created,” he writes, a resonant diagnosis. Urging readers not to surrender to despair, Sanders offers numerous legislative proposals. These would empower labor unions, cut the workweek to 32 hours, regulate campaign spending, reduce gerrymandering, and automatically register 18-year-olds to vote. Grassroots supporters can help by running for local office, volunteering with a campaign, and asking educators how to help support public schools. Meanwhile, Sanders asks us “to question the fundamental moral values that underlie” a system that enables “the top 1 percent” to “own more wealth than the bottom 93 percent.” Though his prose sometimes reads like a transcribed speech with built-in applause lines, Sanders’ ideas are specific, clear, and commonsensical. And because it echoes previous statements, his call for collective introspection lands as genuine.
A powerful reiteration of principles—and some fresh ideas—from the longest-serving independent in congressional history.Pub Date: Oct. 21, 2025
ISBN: 9798217089161
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
