Deck Review: The Alleyway Tarot

I own Publishing Goblin‘s first Kickstarter Tarot deck, The Alleyman’s Tarot, and, while it’s a bit unwieldy to work with, I still love it for reflection purposes, and for thinking about the ways different artists interpret the traditional card meanings. The guidebook is also a cracking read, as opposed to the normal fairly generic guff. So I didn’t hesitate in backing this new deck, The Alleyway Tarot, that follows the same principles as its predecessor. Each card in the deck is designed by a different artist, and the concept is that this is a ‘found’ deck, cobbled together with individual cards that ‘The Alleyman’ has magpied into his life over the years. It’s a really clever concept, and a great way to support multiple talented artists. Many of the cards come from pre-existing Tarot decks, so it’s also a really neat way of discovering new artists/creators and decks you might like. A little try-before-you-buy taster deck!

I’ve scraped gum off the bottoms of my shoes with my deck. I like my shoes better than some cards. The reason why? Cards are a dime a dozen. I’ve nabbed cards off the ground for a reason. No one cares. It’s paper. My real message here is nothing is sacred enough not to be changed. So fuck it all up. And most importantly? Do it with kindness for people. Items, objects, all this is temporary… What really matters is the face of the person you’re talking to. Reading for. Respect their hands. But not the cards. Never the [cards].

The Alleyman

It also personally resonates with me a great deal, as I have my own ‘found street card’ collection. Ever since I was a little kid, every time I have come across a discarded playing card on the street, I have picked it up and hung on to it. Forty-two years on (well, more like 37), as I wasn’t doing it as a toddler/pre-schooler!) this is my collection:

What are their stories? How did they end up abandoned on the street? What happened to their deck-mates? I honestly find them fascinating. And no pairs so far! Maybe one day I’ll collect a whole deck… ;-). It’s also long been my dream to create my own Magpie Deck from all my favourite Tarot cards across my Tarot deck collection. So you can see why both The Alleyman’s and The Alleyway appeal to me!

The Alleyway Tarot a pretty ambitious project, with over 100 new cards. I bought all the add on cards because I am obsessive and have no self control, but as it turns out I don’t really think it needs that many cards. It can feel a bit overwhelming. I have enjoyed going through and picking my ‘favourite 78’ to work with though!

The deck comes in a pretty chonky display box, with one of those cheap looking plastic inserts to hold the cards, which is something I personally really dislike. It’s annoying to take cards in and out of, it looks crap, and it means the whole deck isn’t particularly mobile or user-friendly. It does mean the paperback sized guidebook fits in the box though, which is handy if you’re someone who likes storing deck + guide together (I would take a smaller box + separate LWB personally, but that’s just me). The guidebook is designed to look like a ‘dime store’ pulp book, which I dig. It contains a colour guide to each card with some info about the artist, the overall card meaning, and then The Alleyman’s often irreverent interpretation.

And now for some of my favourite cards from the Alleyway Tarot. I really like the slightly ominous vibes of La Muci’s Magician card. To me this card follows in the tradition of the earliest Tarot decks, where The Magician was depicted as a mountebank or a street-performer. Instead of the more straightforwardly magic portrayals we see in many modern decks, this Magician is as a trickster, a con-artist gifted in the art of smoke and mirrors, but lacking any actual substance. An old fashioned swindler hustling for money. It wasn’t until later that Paul Christian renamed The Juggler as The Magus, and changed him from a fairground hustler to a metaphysical miracle worker. The Alleyman agrees with me, writing in the guidebook that The Magician is “the Batman of magic. If he can prepare he can take on anything… [But] The Magician is not an impossibly capable dude, he’s the veneer of preparation. The Magician can’t actually handle anything, but in this situation he is ready”.

The lilac-drenched High Priestess, with her crescent moon face, is a really beautiful card. The Alleyman writes of her misshapen candle as a metaphor for our intuition; “[she] is a candle in the dark, and waiting too long may see the candle burn to the nub, or a strange breeze taking it away from you. Do not hesitate when you see it”. I more commonly see the idea of metamorphosis represented in Death cards, but I think it works really well in Eliza Kingsbury‘s Judgement card here too. As the guidebook explains, “[Judgement] is the shifting of things towards rejuvenation, much as a cicada’s life spins between the graven earth and the open sky… It is the shell of ourselves inside that is growing, healing, changing, ready to emerge through our flesh to consume the version of us that filled this space before”.

It’s probably not surprising how much I love this Two of Cups, given in my day job I have researched and written this book about why m/m porn and erotica is so popular with women. Just such a gorgeous card – its inclusion on the Kickstarter page actually led to me buying the Eros Tarot by Chain Assembly, so I now have the card twice 😉.

Love this day-dreamy Seven of Cups, which captures the whimsical and escapist element of the card perfectly. However, as the guidebook warns us, the danger of this card is “falling for the movement of the currents with gleaming golden fish when they are actually just fish. Beautiful to behold, certainly, but in a world separate from ours”.

Stefanie Caponi’s Five of Swords portrays the Pyrrhic Victory theme of the card very well – with its central figure (who really reminds me of Diane Nguyen from Bojack Horseman!) holding tight to the swords at her heart and her hip, even as she herself is pierced through the throat by the swords of others. The Alleyman tells us, “when we… walk around with a weapon others will see us as a threat. If you get this card, it means you think you’re in competition with others, and when you fuck around, you find out”.

OK, so the middle card in the above selection is confusing for me. I assumed it was the Queen of Swords partly because Spades = Swords, and that sure looks like a Spade to me! – and partly because the imagery really speaks to what the Queen of Swords represents for me (in short, the wise, no-BS, slightly scarred but steely strong Queen of Logic, the war widow). However, apparently it’s the Queen of Wands?! Ermmm… Anyways, the Alleyman himself told us to do whatever we want with the cards, so for me she’s the Queen of Swords, and that’s that, lol! She has known pain and loss, and she knows death is an inevitable part of life, but she is not afraid. All that she has endured has made her stronger, and now she is ready to nurture that strength and resolve in others.

This gorgeous Eight of Wands is just so pretty, and Ariel is perfect to represent this card in a Shakespeare-themed deck (the card is taken from the Bard’s Arcana). The Alleyman says, “I like to think of it as a series of arrows in the air, coming to strike in a rain of shafts”.

The guidebook explains that The Tower is “the destroying of the old for the new, with the knowledge that you will have to dig deep to enact this change, and to stand by it… The belief that you can make the change, that it can be better, and the will to see it through… is the crux of earning a better life for yourself”. The gorgeous art for this card, with its clear throwbacks to Delacroix, is by Linzi Silverman.

The Alleyway Tarot is a really fun deck to work with, and, even though it’s a bit random at times, I actually think it would be pretty fun to read for others with too (those backs just demand an audience!) You can buy it here.

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