What books should you read to learn tarot? Choose by what you want to learn

There are a lot of tarot books, and it isn't easy to choose when you're starting out.

First think about whether you want to learn card meanings, how to read images, or how to read several cards together. Below they're grouped by those directions.

Just starting

• Joan Bunning, Learning the Tarot: laid out as a course, and free to read on the author's website.
• Sasha Graham's complete guide to the Rider-Waite-Smith deck: goes card by card through the images, good as a reference.
• In Chinese, you can start with 向日葵's 塔羅葵花寶典 or Paul Fenton-Smith's beginner's guide (Chinese edition 其實你已經很塔羅了).
• LUA, 塔羅解牌研究所 (Chinese edition): when you get stuck, the Q&A in the second volume is the most useful.

Going deeper

• Rachel Pollack, Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom: best read once you know the basic meanings, it reads the cards through images and stories.
• Mary K. Greer's two workbooks: one card can be read from many angles.
• The Amberstones' book on symbolism: groups the things that recur in the pictures into themes.

More ways to ask

• Sasha Graham, 365 Tarot Spreads: a spread for every day.
• Liz Dean's guide to spreads: look them up by topic.

Trying another deck

• Marseille tarot: three books by Camelia Elias, Jean-Michel David and Jodorowsky, from easy to deep.
• Playing cards: Richard Webster's introduction, then another book to compare.

Where tarot comes from

• A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot: written by the designer of the Rider-Waite deck himself, and free to read online.
• Stuart R. Kaplan, The Encyclopedia of Tarot and Ryuichi Izumi, タロット大全 (in Japanese): history and editions.

Besides reading, you still need to draw cards. Books tell you how others have seen them; your feel for the cards you have to build one card at a time.

What each book covers, who it suits and how to read it are all in the tarot study room: reading guide. To start with a story, read the Fool's Journey first.

Common questions