Review by Stacy

Visiting the Realm of the Fae

Gifted to me 2018, and after a Tarot card vandal (see above) destroyed several cards (one aptly chosen) gifted again 2020.

Overall: 8/10 Awesome sauce. This is my only deck I’ve needed to replace due to wear and tear (so far). I used this deck until the edges frayed. The cat chewed through the devil of my first deck and maimed several cards so I acquired a second one (dearest husband gifted both to me! It’s a special deck for sure!)

Being my “first love” deck maybe I’m a little bias. Dreamy, ethereal, but dark enough to not feel fluffy. A bit aloof in that Tolkien elven sort of way, it never feels too personal when things are a bit overcast. 

Maybe I was lucky (or unlucky) that the Shadowscapes Tarot is the first deck I learned Tarot from for almost a year before exploring other decks. In a way, starting out with a semi-nontraditional RWS helped me learn how to really sit with an image and think, rather than learning the route RWS meaning. My friend who started reading Tarot about four years before me used this deck almost exclusively and I came to love it when handling it with her.

This version is standard tarot size, with unobtrusive silver borders. Like everyone else on the face of the planet I would happily throw egregious amounts of money for a copy of the deck if the cards were borderless, bigger, with the most amazing cardstock in the world because they are absolutely works of art, each one filled with a unique story and symbolism to the point your eyes cannot even see it! (Spoiler alert: I did discovered the Czech version! Review coming soon.)

I’ve seen others say that Shadowscapes is not beginner friendly and I disagree—there’s so much to work with that piecing together a story for one card, let alone a set of cards, is very easy, not to mention easy on the eyes. It’s just takes time. The accompanying big guide book is great. If you’re easily overwhelmed visually, then yes, perhaps choose another deck.

Starting with such a symbol-rich deck I now heavily rely on a muchness of symbols and pictures and storytelling to put together a cohesive spread in most decks I pick up. It’s the simpler decks that tend to challenge me!

Abused cards—wear, tear, puncture wounds.

Card quality: 2/5 Eh, kinda works. The cards need to be bigger. They’re really prone to bending and being damaged so if you really like this one, spring for an extra set to replace cards as needed (or hunt down the Czech version).

Just LOOK at all the minute detail! I think this two of swords is hands down my absolute favorite–just look at all those things going on around that defensive figure! This classically stagnant card just breaths life here. And check out this mysterious unmasked yet still masked moon; there’s fungus fairies I’ve never even seen until I enlarged this photo on my computer!

Readability: 5/5 I challenge someone to find a modern, RWS fantasy deck with more individual symbolism chalked into each individual card, even the minor non-court cards. It can feel overwhelming (and difficult to see if you don’t have perfect vision) until you really sit with the card and stare at all the details and then…it just clicks. Definitely not a slap-n-dash sort of reader! While this definitely follows the RWS system, many of the cards have a different (albeit related) take, so IF you rely on RWS imagery this might be a good deck to start breaking out of that box.

Dreamy, ethereal, but not fluffy, I would not call this a particularly “earthy” deck though the nature element is very present.  It’s a gentle reader without being suffocating in positivity. All the creatures feel very “perfect” and a bit aloof. Heavy in symbolism, and despite having fantastical creatures in a dream like world, the art does feel relatable to the real world.

The spreads this deck creates is just a feast for the eyes! If you need a deck you want to spend time just ogling this is an excellent candidate.

Law does fantastic job at capturing body shape, movement, and angles which give life to otherwise traditionally stagnant cards, with one notable exception–the six of wands. This also being my least favorite card, felt like the one card that the artist did not feel any inspiration towards. The figure of the man holds the laurel crown out at a weird, unnatural angel. The artist obviously doesn’t have good feelings towards the card either because the world is a muted, muddied battlefield of green/grey/brown against the otherwise brilliant suite of wands.  After learning from several other decks, I do have to admit, I do not have such a bleak view of the six of wands.

Art: 4/5 So the art itself is stunning BUT I do want to acknowledge that all the bodies are more or less the same and there is little representation of people of color (outside of one brown woman and a few Asian peoples) in here. I don’t see any indication of LGBTQ+ or gender nonconforming representation either. I feel some of the masculine cards (like five of swords) DO feel more feminine than they could have been portrayed. I did feel the need for a diverse deck and have looked elsewhere to fill that void. 

There’s a maturity about Shadowscapes that for fantasy art is a relief. I love me some fae, but I hate how some artists make female fairies “slutty/hyper sexual” for no good reason and this deck doesn’t even come close to that sort of feeling, though there is some tasteful and sensible nudity: the seven of pentacles comes to mind but unless you were looking for nipples, you might mistaken the nymphs tattoos for a shirt. Also strength is naked too, but that makes sense to me because vulnerability is part of inner strength. Five of Pentacles shows exposed breast, which makes sense for the card.

The challenging cards in this deck are pretty gentle, perhaps the most difficult being the Three of Swords.

Every card is welcoming and gentle and genteel, there’s few critical, mean, or scary card in the deck: three of swords is an impaled swan, and the eight of swords is a distressed trapped swan, but these come off as more dark metaphors that actual violence inducing. Death is a Phoenix, and the tower is clearly an act of nature on a sturdy (wooden) artifice of nature so you don’t have to shoulder the blame for “building a weak foundation” as the Tower seems to be interpreted these days. My favorite card, the five of swords is by far the most “violent” imo, since that angel is clearly swooping down to kick ass and take names, ask questions later.

The book gives both interpretive positive/negative readings of the artwork without the concreteness of reversals–but honestly I use reversals (with intuitive interpretations) in this deck because the back loans itself well and the artwork plays along quite easily.

Favorite card: 5 of Swords If that’s not the most bad ass avenging elf angel I’ve ever seen I’ll eat my shoes. I know this is supposed to be a “bad” card, but I’m never upset to see this one.

Least Favorite Card: 6 of Wands—I don’t like the awkward arm of the man and it feels very ominous with that pea soup colored background and post-war battlefield-like scene. I feel like the warning that this is a temporal success is a little…too challenging.

Card the deck identifies me as: The deck has decided that the Queen of Cups represents me in my normal, creative self, though I have to admit that I don’t particularly resonate with her, but I do feel a connection with the action she is doing (lol!). Conversely, when I am being naughty, this deck will spit out the Knight of Wands and be saucy for a few days.

Season: Spring (so ethereal! much ephemeral!)

Boxes it checks: Fae, Elf, Ethereal, Dreamy, Fantasy, Romantic, Aloof, Detail Oriented, Love Readings

Similar Decks: There aren’t any decks that capture the ethereal nature of the art, but other fairy decks that I personally think are along this vein are The Tarot of the Hidden Realm, Tarot of the Sidhe, Circle of Life Tarot, The Lost Forest Deck, The Children of Litha Tarot, Lisa Hunt’s The Fairytale Tarot, Superlunaris Tarot (the color pallet really reminds me of the Shadowscapes)

P.S. our artist has been in the middle of making a WONDROUS Oracle deck for several years and I hope it comes out before I die!