The Vampire Tarot

I am no one to review a masterpiece of Robert Place. This is a must have for a dark deck lover

i love this deck and how Robert M. Place shows how dracula is like a tarot deck

Superb. I have trimmed the corners. I give RWS meanings to these cards. I accept that in so doing so, I lose a little with regards to the special meanings and character of the deck....but I accept this gladlyThe cards are great stock, very hardy but are not readily reversible but this can be overcome by ardent reversal fans like me with just a little thought and ingenuity

This is Robert Place, and that alone should be enough to guarantee for you that the art is superb. These cards are THE reference for vampire tarot decks, now and in the future. Don't buy anything else before you have THIS deck. A must-have, if you collect vampire decks. 500 Gold Stars!

This handsome boxed set is a great value for the money. The cards are large and varnish-coated, and come shrink-wrapped and you will probably have to pry them apart, as the high-gloss finish makes them sticky. My cards came apart however without damage. I thought the size and finish might make these cards difficult to shuffle, but the cardstock proved surprisingly supple. One minor disappointment: the square corners on these cards - I would have preferred rounded corners, and I may end up taking a craft store corner-rounder to them.On to the images. If you are familiar with Robert Place, you know that some of his interpretations are different from the standard Rider Waite, and more in line with Marseilles-type interpretations. That said, the images he has chosen can be interpreted in a number of ways and are not inconsistent with the more widespread (in America, anyway) RWS meanings, with the exception being the Cups suit, where the author really diverges from the Rider Waite system (the 8 of cups, for example, shows a stack of weapons, and the card meaning is "variety"). Also, the minor suits are renamed: Garlic Flowers for Pentacles, Holy Water for Cups, Stakes for Wands, and Knives for Swords. All are weapons used to defeat vampires.There is a hefty companion book describing in great detail the Bram Stoker novel Dracula, which inspired this deck (although other sources are used, including works of Poe and Coleridge). There is also a long history of tarot, which will be familiar to those who have already read Place's other works. The companion book does a good job with meanings on the major arcana, but the descriptions for the minor arcana are short, and feel a little perfunctory. Again, this is consistent with the companion books for Place's other decks.Most importantly, the artwork is stunning. Place continues to use his terrific line-shading, but combines it with color shading to produce a new impression of three-dimenality. Some of the vampire faces just seem to glow in bluish white. The colors are vibrant, high-impact, with sharply contrasting white and black, and lots of browns, reds, and purple-blues. The court cards are portraits of famous artists, associates, and characters of gothic literature, set to backgrounds of dusky turqoise, rose, green and amber. They are truly lovely. If you are a fan of 19th century literature, or of vampires, I predict you will want this deck. (But if you still need further prompting, you can see all the cards at Tarot Connection, where you can order a votive candle of your favorite card.) Get this deck!

このイラストレーターは他に２〜３タロットカード描いていますが、どれも結構オーソドックスとはかけ離れた個性的なデッキです。この吸血鬼タロットもかなりエグイですね。。もちろん例の吸血鬼のお話に出てくるキャラが描かれています。ネットの画像であらかじめ見たイラストの印象がちょっとオドロオドロしいかな、、と思っていましたが、実際手にして見るとけっこう楽しい雰囲気が伝わって来るので不思議。サイズは手のひらほどあり大きめです。四つ角は丸くなくスクエアなカード（角丸の型抜きでなく四方断ち）です。外箱もかなりデッカくて、分厚めのりっぱなサイズのBookとセットです。私は1にも2にもコレクション用に買いましたが、実占には向いてないと思います。。なんといってもカードの質が困りものです。紙がぶ厚くてしかもビニールコーティング（PP張り）なので一枚一枚がバリバリとくっついています。最初バラバラにするのに一苦労。一旦剥がしてもこれをスムーズにシャッフルは出来そうにもありません。イラストは素晴しいのでコレクターにはお勧めです。