You will find that I rarely jump into something with both feet in the world of Divination. The last time I did was over a decade ago, Petit Lenormand and we all know how that ended up – A Love Affair of my Heart and. Mind that still goes on !!

Now to be fair, I did enter into a brief affair with Mildred Payne’s Secret Pocket Oracle – I guess I was fickle there and didn’t give her the time she deserved so I will be going back to her one day. I also do have a love of Pendulums – my Dad actually started that when we dowsed for a well on property we were purchasing in the Catskill Mountains for a second home. And of course Tarot, but not the psycho babble/self help venue of it, picture more the early 70’s, late 60’s of it when Fortune Telling was still was taught with this deck. Yes I have another family member to blame for my Tarot workings. But now ……

Well I can blame this new interest on someone as well. If you are familiar with the film Practical Magic and know the Aunts, well I am one of them and the other is Stella of the Fate Keeps on Happening Blog. She and I are rather close and well she just gets me into things, Livre du Destin / Book of Fate is what she talked about and here we are. I quickly ordered the deck from an Etsy Seller; https://www.etsy.com/listing/1234762985/handmade-livre-du-destin-cards-in-a-bag?click_key=58b3241658319fb22b126d358851a16a5fdf9642%3A1234762985&click_sum=18007514&ref=shop_home_active_16&pro=1 because I have learned if Stella is telling me something – it bears looking into. Well down the rabbit hole I have gone. This deck is old world, made on an amazing card stock and just speaks to those of us who do like things of a more “antique” nature. The link above is where I purchased mine but Stella has another option for you.

The link to Stella’s post is here;

https://fatekeepson.blogspot.com/2024/08/livre-du-destin-book-of-fate.html

I suggest you read her post before continuing as she covers a lot that I am sure not do justice to and so won’t even address. What I will say right away is this deck is fun. Now fun for me might not be fun for you. You need a pencil and notebook and a nice block of time, I am about 11 hours in and have barely scratched the surface of how I think these cards converse. The deck comes with some card meanings, a one sheet LWB Benebell Wen created I believe. Now I am a fan of Benebell but as with all things you can disagree – some of these meanings I don’t quite hold to. There is also, if you can find a copy, the LWB that came with the deck when Grimauld produced it – that one take with a HUGE grain of salt. I will also say if you are a fan of using just intuitive readings this is not what I think would be the deck for you – I could be wrong, just saying.

Stella did note in her blog post and I must mention here – there are a lot of people cards. As so many people have a tough time with people cards or Court Cards in Tarot this deck might challenge you in the same way.

I started a notebook with one page per card and wrote down, whether I agreed with it or not, the meanings from the Grimauld LWB as well as the one that came from the one sheet given with the deck I purchased. I am now adding to this by doing small readings and filling in notes on how those cards represent themselves. I am making sure to do readings on different types of context – work, relationship (love or otherwise), etc. to best find out the meanings of these cards in all kinds of ways. I am taking a rather practical way of looking at the images, icons much like Lenormand is how I am working with them at the moment. I am then able to formulate from all of this how the cards are conversing, the information they are sharing. I look at a process of this much like I think an archeologist does at a dig site, go slowly and carefully, examine and evaluate and then move to the next level.

I would suggest using simple 3 or 5 card line readings to start with and working yourself up. The older cartomancy lines and squares are where I think this deck will work best as far as spreads go. I am not sure if the more Tarot spread orientated positions will work well or not, I haven’t progressed past 5 cards at the moment and don’t think I will for a bit. Then after I get this more worked out I will move on to readings for others – my real proving ground of a divination tool. I will say this, if you are not interested in putting in the time, working with a deck that has no books and you must do all the work and research, and working with an obscure deck that won’t see the light of day in most reading groups – stay away, The Book of Fate I do believe guards it secrets well.

So why did I post this? Well I so rarely post that first off it was about time don’t you think? Then there is the fact that I think I might be onto something here, a good down to earth no nonsense tool (Thank you again Stella for the heads up !!) that will do well for me over time. Lastly I like to share the diamonds in the rough, the tools you get to learn on your own, forge a path to understanding and then (oh goodness I sound like one of the YouTube Tarot Goddesses here) find joy in the accomplishment of my own hard work. Crystals, Nag Champa and New Age music are not required to learn this deck 🙂

Until I post again, Hugh

PS – if you know of a user friendly, non – AI generated, blog host other then WordPress which I currently use, I would appreciate hearing about it. I am finding this system harder and harder to use ! If this post seems a bit choppy I must admit I have had quite the time trying to format, grammar and spell check, etc. time I think for a new venue.