20 Excellent Tarot Books to Learn From

Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom – Rachel Pollack

A must-have among tarot books. When it was first published nearly 40-years-ago, Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom was an instant classic and inspired generations of tarot students. Often referred to as the “bible of tarot books” it has now helped to launch the “tarot renaissance” we’re seeing today. Drawing on mythology and esoteric traditions and delving deeply into the symbolism and ideas of each card, the book offers a modern psychological interpretation of the tarot archetypes rather than a system of esoteric symbolism.

This book provides:

• A concise history of tarot
• An introduction to common tarot spreads
• A clear and endlessly useful reference for both beginning and advanced tarot students

The Only Tarot Book You’ll Ever Need – Skye Alexander

A helpful one among tarot books. Not long ago, getting your cards read would have conjured images of a mystic shrouded in scarves with a crystal ball, waving her hands over a spread of cards. Today, a tarot reading is as common as going to yoga or texting a friend. It’s the new way to seek guidance—whether that’s relationship advice or what outfit to wear today.

With the help of this beautifully illustrated guide, you’ll be able to harness this skill to read your own future in tarot cards. Filled with custom card images and easy-to-understand descriptions of each card and many different reading layouts, The Only Tarot Book You’ll Ever Need will help you to master the tarot, whether your aim is to perform traditional readings, consult the cards as part of a daily self-care ritual, use them for interactive self-reflection, or rely on them as a tool for thinking through particular challenges or questions. A good guide among tarot books.

Wild Card – Jen Cownie

Every time you draw a card, you open up possibilities. What will appear and what will you see? What lessons could the cards offer up? What aspects of yourself might they reveal?

Discover the tarot with Wild Card, a friendly, funny and straightforward guide to the seventy-eight cards, their stories and meanings among tarot books.

At its heart, the tarot is a storytelling device, a deck of symbols and narratives that can spark conversations, inspire ideas, and reveal new perspectives. And you don’t need to be psychic to use it: it is a practice that is open to everyone. In this beautifully illustrated guide, tarot readers Jen Cownie and Fiona Lensvelt introduce each of the cards, drawing on literature, pop culture, and their own experiences, and encourage you to add your voice to this centuries-old tradition.

Whether you are learning to read for yourself and others, refreshing your knowledge, or just curious, Wild Card will show you how the tarot can add a little bit of magic to your life. A new one among tarot books.

The Big Book of Tarot Meanings – Sam Magdaleno

Find precise answers to your urgent questions—The Big Book of Tarot Meanings takes you beyond typical, generic card meanings by breaking each card down into eight interpretation categories among tarot books.

Interpreting card meanings is the most exciting aspect of reading tarot. However, it is also the most challenging, especially if you are new to the art. For example, basic tarot interpretation would have you understand that The Lovers card has to do with relationships—but what if your question had to do with career or health? How are you left to interpret the meaning?

The Big Book of Tarot Meanings solves these dilemmas by breaking down each card into the eight most-queried categories, starting with Beginnings and ending with Outcome, with a meaning for each category, upright and reversed. No longer will you have to vaguely extrapolate meaning and insight for diverse questions from the same generic description often given in other beginner tarot books.

In addition to providing fine-tuned interpretations, The Big Book of Tarot Meaningssolves a second common question that comes with a tarot reading—How do I apply this knowledge to my everyday life?—by giving you an action item for each meaning, upright and reversed. A must-have among tarot books.

The Ultimate Guide to Tarot – Alan Blackmond

Are you fascinated by the mysteries of tarot cards? Would you like to learn how to read and interpret tarot simply and effectively? Whether you are a beginner or an expert, this book is for you among tarot books!

This book is a simple and complete guide which, step by step, will teach you the art of tarot reading. Tarot cards link us to the stars and to our destiny through interpretive readings of them. There is much more to them than that, of course, and learning how to read and interpret them can take long years of patience and practice.

The Ultimate Guide to Tarot, however, seeks to help you gain an understanding of the mysteries of Tarot quickly and easily, so that you then have a base to work from. A good one among tarot books.

Tarot for Your Self – Mary K. Greer

This tarot classic by Mary K. Greer was the first book to promote reading the cards for your own insight, revolutionizing tarot through a combined emphasis on self-teaching techniques and personal growth. 

Tarot for Your Self uses meditations, rituals, spreads, mandalas, visualizations, dialogues, charts, affirmations, and other activities to help you establish your own relationship with the cards. All the information is presented using the best in traditional knowledge and know-how. This powerful breakthrough process will turn all your readings into truly transformative experiences.

Tarot for Your Self covers interpretations for the major and minor arcana, reversed card meanings for all 78 cards, and enlightening information on your shadow/teacher cards. A classic among tarot books.

The Ultimate Guide to Tarot – Liz Dean

Discover the facts, myth, history, and mystery of the spiritual art of Tarot-reading. Whether you want to learn to read the cards or deepen your Tarot interpretation skills, The Ultimate Guide to Tarot honors the deep heritage of Tarot, while guiding you through practical techniques.

Tarot expert Liz Dean offers an overview to all of the important elements of each card from symbols, to links with astrology, kabbala and numerology. The Ultimate Guide to Tarot also includes all the classic tarot spreads – Celtic Cross, Horseshoe, Star and Astrological Year Ahead – plus, a mini-layout to try for each of the 22 major cards.

Learn how to combine the three essential ingredients of a great tarot reading: knowing the meaning of the cards, how to lay them out, and trusting the intuitive messages the images often spark within us during a reading. This synthesis is the true magic of tarot.

With the authority and confidence this book offers, The Ultimate Guide to Tarot will be the must-have companion for beginner readers and tarot aficionados alike. A good choice among tarot books.

How to Read Tarot – Jessica Wiggan

Tarot is a powerful, mystical tool that can help you discover what’s destined for you and those around you. This modern tarot book will teach you everything you need to know about this time-honored practice, how the universe speaks through tarot spreads, and how you can use tarot to improve your love, work, personal, and spiritual lives.

What sets How to Read Tarot apart from other tarot deck books:

• Tarot basics–Begin your tarot journey learning how to use your deck; exploring the relationship between tarot, astrology, and numerology; and understanding how to perform readings for others.
• Detailed card breakdowns–Tarot decks are broken up into the major and minor arcana, which represent the big and small events in your life. You’ll review each of these cards and their ancient symbols to learn how they can provide guidance and insight.
• Tarot card starter spreads–Learn to peer into your past, present, and future with a three-card spread; delve into a big decision with a Celtic cross spread; look at every aspect of your life with a 21-card spread; and more.

Connect with the cards, the universe, and your unlimited potential with How to Read Tarot. An easy guide among tarot books.

Everyday Tarot – Brigit Esselmont

veryday Tarot takes a fresh approach to a timeless art, giving modern soul-seekers the tools they need to access their inner wisdom and create an inspired life, using the cards as their guide. This contemporary approach to Tarot is empowering, uplifting, powerful, and practical — instead of seeking to tell the future, this method allows readers to unlock their full potential by connecting more deeply to their own instincts and intuition.

This unique book draws on the knowledge of Brigit Esselmont, the renowned Tarot reader and founder of Biddy Tarot. Her distinctive approach blends Tarot with personal growth, creating an actionable wellness practice that speaks to contemporary readers.

Beginning with Esselmont’s personal story of leaving behind a corporate career to pursue a more grounded, passionate life, this beautiful and useful volume explains how Tarot really works, with a focus on how we approach the cards and draw on our inner wisdom for guidance. 

Everyday Tarot moves through concrete areas of life (career, romantic relationships, major goals) and incorporates exercises and sample spreads, alongside a quick-start guide to reading the cards that reinforces big picture concepts and builds confidence as readers begin creating powerful and positive change among tarot books.

The Modern Tarot Reader – Claire Goodchild

Let award-winning artist and astrologer Claire Goodchild help you to unlock the ancient mysteries of the tarot as you harness this powerful tool of self-discovery and spiritual growth.

This elegant pack comes complete with a hauntingly beautiful tarot deck and a brief guide to the art. A new one among tarot books.

Modern Tarot – Michelle Tea

Whether you’re a dyed-in-the-wool seeker or a digital-age skeptic—or a little of both—the power of tarot is open to you. Modern Tarot doesn’t require you to believe in the supernatural or to focus narrowly on using the tarot as a divination tool. Instead, it offers fiercely insightful descriptions of each of the seventy-eight cards in the tarot system (each one fully illustrated by Amanda Verwey) and specially designed rituals to guide readers on a path toward transformative personal growth.

Grounded in Tea’s decades of tarot wisdom and personal experience, this is a guide that beginners will fall in love with and experienced readers will learn from anew. With her trademark one-of-a-kind insight and wit, Tea shows how tarot offers moments of deep, authentic connection during a time when “connection” is ubiquitous but rarely delves beneath the surface—and how the affirming and personal nature of the Tarot offers a spiritual experience that is gentle, individual, and aspirational. A much-loved one among tarot books.

Guided Tarot – Stefanie Caponi

Each of us holds gifts deep within and, with tarot, we have the power to unlock those gifts and make transformative discoveries. For beginner tarot readers, learning the cards all 78 of them and understanding how to use spreads may seem daunting.

Tarot expert Stefanie Caponi explains that interpreting the cards is a blend of knowing the card meanings, listening to your heart, and trusting your intuition. In her book, GUIDED TAROT, she offers easy exercises to nurture and grow your intuition, not only to understand the cards’ universal meanings, but to channel your own meanings.

This comprehensive guide also shows you how to attune your energy to the deck for more accurate readings. Soon you’ll be confident in doing readings for yourself and even your friends. An easy guide among tarot books.

Twist Your Fate – Theresa Reed

Are you running your own show or is your life running you? Wondering how some people seem to reach the top with ease while you’re struggling to figure out where to even begin? Some people are born (financially, socially) into good “fate,” but most of us need to twist fate to achieve our best lives. The best way to twist fate to your advantage is to know your strengths, pay attention to what’s happening around you, and trust your instincts.

Understanding the strengths and weaknesses of your natal chart, being attuned to the insights that Tarot can provide, and trusting your intuition are the tools you need to master any situation and create success on your terms. TWIST YOUR FATE will show you how to find your best path and maximize your talents.

You’ll learn how to use Tarot to brainstorm new creative ideas, compare career options, and make intelligent decisions. You’ll also learn how astrology can help you find divine timing for every situation with this book among tarot books.

The Creative Tarot – Jessa Crispin

A hip, accessible, and practical guide for artists and creative people looking to tarot for guidance and inspiration in the tradition of The Secret Language of Birthdays and Steal Like an Artist among tarot books.

What if the path to creativity was not as challenging as everyone thinks? What if you could find that spark, plot twist, or next project by simply looking at your life and your art through a different lens?

Written for novices and seasoned readers alike, The Creative Tarot is a unique guidebook that reimagines tarot cards and the ways they can boost the creative process. Jessa Crispin guides you through the intuitive world of the tarot to get those creative juices flowing again.

Thought to be esoteric and mystical, tarot cards are approachable and endlessly helpful to overcoming creative blocks. Crispin offers spiritual readings of the cards, practical information for the uninspired artist, and a wealth of fascinating anecdotes about famous artists, including Virginia Woolf, Rembrandt, and David Bowie, and how they found inspiration.

With five original tarot spreads and beautiful illustrations throughout, The Creative Tarot is an accessible, colourful guide that demystifies both the tarot and the creative process. An easy guide among tarot books.

WTF is Tarot? & How Do I Do It? – Bakara Wintner

A fun one among tarot books. You do not need to learn the tarot because you already know it. It is from this radical jumping off point that WTF Is Tarot breaks down the ancient art of cartomancy. This fresh, accessible and sometimes cheeky guide sheds a holistic light on how to read tarot, from the foundation of magic itself to understanding those tricky court cards to offering readings to others.

In WTF Is Tarot, author and tarot reader Bakara Wintner unpacks the magic of the Major and Minor Aracana with shamanic wisdom and girl boss wit, illuminating their meaning with thoughtful anecdotes and analogies that reveal how deeply rooted these symbols already are in our everyday lives – we can feel the Moon in a howling barefoot run through Prospect Park, accept the grace of Temperance in falling in love or a divine intervention, “ghost the haters” with the Six of Swords, or identify when it’s time to let go of an ex with the Flanged Man.

WTF is Tarot offers far more than a refreshingly candid tutorial on card reading. Bakara goes on to investigate the magic of crystal healing, chakras, meditation and other magical practices. This young witch offers not just a guide, but an invitation for even the most mundane Muggles to welcome magic into their lives, and for experienced wizards to rediscover it once again. For the ones that love all the magic among tarot books.

Truly Easy Tarot – Mantis

Tarot beginners, rejoice! Truly Easy Tarot will teach you how to use tarot cards through a practical, accessible framework, including an escalating progression of card spreads, from simple one-card readings to elaborate multi-card spreads. Honoring traditional tarot meanings while also interpreting their contemporary definitions, this tarot book for the modern age will guide you in your own tarot journey.

This helpful resource includes:

• Tarot’s history–Observe how it evolved from a game to a system of introspection and divination, from its roots to its modern-day existence.
• Major Arcana–Learn about the main cards of the deck representing larger archetypes and major landmarks in life, and see how they connect us to the greater arcs of your personal story line.
• Minor Arcana–Discover cards that reflect the day-to-day details of your existence, and see how they offer insight into how your present situation affects you.

Discover the essentials of tarot with Truly Easy Tarot. an essential for beginners among tarot books.

Tarot Beyond the Basics – Anthony Louis

Most Tarot books are for beginners. Here, Anthony Louis, famous for Tarot Plain and Simple, shares decades of insights and information that can help you become an advanced practitioner. Not merely “more of the same”, Louis provides real world examples of how to use your intuition to improve your readings, how to understand Tarot reversals and how to include the meanings of numbers, the elements, and the Tarot’s Court Cards.

Louis reveals the common background of astrology and Tarot, explaining astrology for Tarot readers clearly and in a way that makes sense. Then he shows how to use the Tarot with astrological concepts to give advanced readings that change people’s lives. Not a beginner? Choose this among tarot books.

Tarot and Astrology – Corrine Kenner

Enrich and expand your tarot practice with age-old wisdom from the stars. Entwined for six centuries, the link between tarot and astrology is undeniably significant. This unique and user-friendly guide makes it easy to explore and learn from this fascinating intersection – and you don’t even need to know astrology to get started.

Discover how each major arcana corresponds to an astrological sign or planet, where each minor arcana sits on the Zodiac wheel, how the court cards and tarot suits are connected to the four elements – and what all this means. Also included are astrological spreads and reading techniques to help you apply these new cosmic insights. For the ones that are into astrology as well among tarot books.

Fearless Tarot – Elliot Adam

Transcend your fear of negative cards with this beginner-friendly guide to the Rider-Waite-Smith tarot. Using his engaging and easy-going style, Elliot Adam teaches you how to move through the shadows and into the light no matter what card you pull. We’ve all been there: hoping for the best as we draw a card but oh no, it s the Devil! This book shows you that fear won t prevail every card can become something positive.

Elliot helps you find the courage to tackle any reading by explaining both upright and reversed meanings in a constructive way. His approach features unique spreads and interpretations, and he encourages you to use inner wisdom to start an uplifting dialogue with your deck. This book among tarot books provides everything you need to fearlessly read tarot.

The Tarot Bible – Sarah Bartlett

The Tarot Bible teaches you everything you need to know about tarot, including how to choose the right pack of cards and how to ask questions. It features interpretations for every card of the Major and Minor Arcana, practical advice on how to give readings and how you can use tarot in combination with other divination techniques such as numerology, astrology and crystals.

The book also features over 30 tarot layouts that you can use to gain insights into yourself, your relationships and your future. A good one among tarot books.