The Complete Tarot Kit

U.S. Games's 2008 kit packages the modern tradition's two poles in one box: the Rider-Waite and the Thoth, with Susan Levitt's comparative introduction walking both, full-color card pairings side by side. As pedagogy the design is shrewd, because the two decks disagree instructively, Waite's Christianized narrative scenes against Crowley's abstract esoteric engine, and seeing the same card argued two ways teaches more about tarot's range than either deck alone can. The kit answers the perennial beginner question, which tradition do I learn, with the only honest answer: hold both and notice which one keeps pulling your eye. Levitt's text keeps the comparison civil, which the decks' authors famously could not. It suits beginners who want the whole map before choosing a road, teachers running comparative sessions, and readers of either deck curious what the rival pole actually says. Committed partisans of one camp already own their half and can skip the summit meeting.