I know the person doing the kickstarter and I’ve used a prototype. This is a very cool deck for writers.
From the kickstarter:
Tarot has been used for hundreds of years for many purposes, from personal examination, fortune telling, religious rituals, to many other creative and spiritual uses. Now Amber and I are using it for writing.
Each time a person uses the cards in a reading, they’re telling a story. This deck uses words, images, and phrases to stimulate the writer’s journey using Tarot archetypes. As such, the cards have been renamed and repurposed, transforming the Fool into the Protagonist, the High Priestess into Mystery, the Empress into Growth, the Emperor into Agency, and so forth.
As the writer and developer, I have reframed each card in the Major Arcana to better serve the needs of writers seeking to use the Tarot as a writing tool. The Major Arcana still describe the protagonist’s quest, but in words geared toward writing rather than the arcane. The Minor Arcana speak to the smaller components of a character’s life. I have redesigned them to address the forms of conflict a character can experience through their journey. Thus the cards progress from the nascence of a character’s journey to the very end of their story.
I first came up with the concept for the deck when I began using Tarot cards not just for personal use or clients, but also for my own stories. Every time I came to a difficult point in a plot or a hard spot with characterization, I would take out my cards and read them for the character or situation. This proved to be a valuable tool in my writing toolbox and I hope it will be one in yours as well.
Using this deck will help you bust through your writer’s block and develop new ways to look at your plots, your characters, and your worlds.
With this Kickstarter, you are supporting the production of this Tarot deck. The funds raised from this project will be used to pay the designer and writer, print both the deck and the book, pay the Kickstarter fees, and ship rewards to backers by April 2017. Thank you so much for backing us in our endeavor to bring this deck to life.
Using tarot to assist with storytelling seems like an interesting blending that would work well together. My kids have some story dice that they play with on a semi-regular basis; at our local toy store (not a big-box type), there also have some cool sci-fi/fantasy themed story dice, too. If it helps you coalesce your imaginings into a story, I say go for it.