{"id":23268,"date":"2020-12-01T01:10:22","date_gmt":"2020-12-01T05:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/?p=23268"},"modified":"2020-11-10T13:59:18","modified_gmt":"2020-11-10T17:59:18","slug":"book-review-the-divination-handbook-by-liz-dean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/2020\/12\/01\/book-review-the-divination-handbook-by-liz-dean\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review – The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More by Liz Dean"},"content":{"rendered":"

Book Review<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

The Divination Handbook<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

by Liz Dean<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

Fair Winds Press<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

176 Pages<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/h1>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I love little guidebooks like this. I must have well over a dozen of them. In each one, there\u2019s an overview of a half-a-dozen or so divination methods \u2013 sometimes more \u2013 and even though the information may often be more or less the same in all <\/i>the books, they each <\/i>have some nugget of enlightenment that the other books don\u2019t have \u2013 which is why I collect these books. And quite honestly, you can\u2019t have too many books!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer’s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry and More<\/a>\"\"<\/u><\/span><\/span> is written by Liz Dean, an author, Tarot reader and divination teacher based in London, England. Her books include <\/span><\/span>The Ultimate Guide to Tarot<\/a>\"\"<\/u><\/span><\/span>, <\/span><\/span>A Thousand Paths to Mindfulness<\/a>\"\"<\/u><\/span><\/span>, and <\/span><\/span>The Magic of Tarot<\/a>\"\"<\/u><\/span><\/span>, just to name a few. Her web site is <\/span><\/span>HERE<\/span><\/span><\/a> and it ha<\/span><\/span>s<\/span><\/span> information on all her books, reading the tarot, tarot spreads and much more. Check it out!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More<\/u> is published by Fair Winds Press, an imprint of The Quarto Group. They publish books on a variety of subjects, all clustered on the wholistic health spectrum. They also publish Oracle Cards for divination. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The book is beautifully printed on shiny stock and has lovely pictures. For a slender book, it is packed with information. I advise you to read the Introduction. I know people who skip over Introductions and Prefaces, however, there is always <\/i>important information in these opening sections, and the Introduction of The Divination Handbook<\/u> is no different. Dean says right off the bat that if you are doing a divinatory reading to find out the future you have to remember that \u201cthe future is not fixed.\u201d (Dean, 9). Since we have free will, once we know our future, we can change that outcome. This is eminently <\/i>important to remember!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Another crucial point that she makes in the Introduction is about how to \u201cformulate your question\u201d (Dean, 9). She says that most people already \u201cknow the answer\u201d to what they\u2019re asking and what they\u2019re seeking is \u201cconfirmation\u201d which is beyond the scope of the reading. (Dean, 9). She suggests asking questions such as \u201cWhat can make me happy?\u201d or \u201cWhat do I need to know now?\u201d \u2013 questions that will lead to a \u201cbroader, more rewarding reading.\u201d (Dean, 9). I found this to be the most important part of the book \u2013 on the first page that I read. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter One is about divining with crystals. I own a fair amount of crystals but I had never thought of using them for divinatory purposes \u2013 not in the way Dean does! That was quite a revelation. The thing is, you\u2019d have to really invest in all kinds of crystals to make this kind of divination practice work and that might run into a financial problem for some of us. I personally only own some clear Quartz pieces, some Rose Quartz, a lovely little piece of Aventurine and a vial of Herkimer diamonds. My other crystals \u2013 my Malachite, my Onyx, my Garnet \u2013 are all on set within rings or hanging on pendants \u2013 where I want them to stay. However, if I am able to get a decent collection of crystals, this might be a cool way to start using my divinatory skills. And who doesn\u2019t like a nice collection of pretty stones?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The next chapter is about using a pendulum. I\u2019ve had a pendulum for years and before I had a proper pendulum, I used a button on a string or one of my rosaries as a pendulum \u2013 just as my grandmother taught me. I was taught to ask simple yes and no questions and depending on how the pendulum swung, that is how you got your answer. The pendulum also told pregnant women if she was carrying a boy or a girl. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

What I learned in this book was how to use \u201cPendulum charts\u201d. I had never heard of Pendulum charts but they make perfect sense when you think about it! I particularly like the Chakra Chart on page 38 but Dean shows us how to create a Pendulum chart for any set of options. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter Three is dedicated to Runes and Chapter Four is Divination with Tea. Chapter Five is Palmistry. This is a subject in which I am quite interested. I wish I had more people in my life \u2013 with COVID-19, I am now completely solitary \u2013 so I could truly learn this divination method. I study my own hands but I think I might learn faster \u2013 and easier \u2013 if I had other people to practice upon. And there\u2019s a lot <\/i>to learn! This chapter is chock-full of charts and diagrams. I understand why palm readers do nothing <\/i>but read palms!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter Six is about the Tarot, which has always been my first and favorite form of divinatory preference. Dean gives clear, concise advice on how to read the cards \u2013 focusing on the question, \u201cWhat do I need to see?\u201d in regards to the situation that being examined. (Dean, 116). Again \u2013 I think this is probably the most important concept in this entire book \u2013 the framing of your divinatory question. The entire reading \u2013 whether it\u2019s with Tarot cards, crystals, tea leaves or what have you \u2013 stems from this all-important view.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

She shares three spreads, which are well-known to most of us who have been reading Tarot Cards for a length of time \u2013 the \u201cPast, Present, Future\u201d spread, with three cards, \u201cThe Week Ahead\u201d spread, using seven cards for each day of the week and a significator card, and of course, \u201cThe Celtic Cross\u201d spread. Like most \u201cCeltic Cross\u201d spreads, it\u2019s a bit different than ones in other books and I am excited to add it to my collection of \u201cCeltic Cross\u201d spreads in my Tarot notebook! <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Dean advises \u201ccleansing\u201d your deck in between readings by going through the deck and turning \u201cany reversed card the right way up\u201d. Next, she says, \u201cchoose one or both\u201d of these instant cleansing techniques: blowing on your deck as you flick through the cards or hold the card in one hand and with the cards facedown, \u201cknown out unwanted energies with a firm, single knock on top of the deck.\u201d (Dean, 120)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I have to admit that in over thirty years of reading Tarot cards, I have never heard of doing this. But hey \u2013 you learn something new every day, right? So now I am going to go through all my cards and give them a thorough cleansing! <\/i><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 7 is Numerology, which makes sense, given that the Tarot and Numerology have so much to do with one another. To be sure, one does not have to know anything about Numerology to read Tarot cards, nor does one have to read Tarot cards to do good work with Numerology. However, the two disciplines go together like apple pie and vanilla ice cream, so it is proper that they are set together in this book. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Like anything written about Numerology, Dean tells us how to add up our birth numbers to get our Life Path Number. One thing she mentions that I hadn\u2019t heard before was that to \u201ctake note of any repeating numbers in the date of the birth\u201d (Dean, 146) which indicate a secondary Life Path number. In my case, I have two 9\u2019s and two 1\u2019s, so that means I have two extra Life Path numbers. Which honestly explains a lot. <\/i><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

To find our Destiny numbers, we need to know the full name on our birth certificate. Dean provides a chart to make this process easy:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Our Soul numbers are calculated using only the vowels in our names; our Personality numbers are found by adding the consonants in our names. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

We can also add up the numbers for various nicknames or business names, as needed. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

By assembling all these numbers and then reading the portraits of the personalities of these numbers between 151 and 163, we can come up with a reasonable psychological profile of ourselves or anyone we wish to examine. We can also see if we will get along with other people \u2013 all based on our numerological profile! <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The last chapter is about scrying with a crystal ball. I have a crystal ball but it\u2019s been a long time since I have used it. Reading this chapter made me want to bring out my ball and use it again. One thing I liked was Dean\u2019s assertion that \u201ctradition suggests you begin a scrying session just before twilight\u201d \u2013 that works with my natural inclinations. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The main question with scrying with a crystal ball is what does one see? Dean writes that \u201cyou may receive them in your mind rather than through an image on the ball\u201d (Dean, 172) so it is important to remember that you\u2019re probably not going to see images in the crystal like in \u201cThe Wizard of Oz\u201d or other movies. (But wouldn\u2019t that be cool?) <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

All in all, The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More<\/u> by Liz Dean is a fabulous little book, packed with information \u2013 much more than I could write about here! I couldn\u2019t recommend it more highly. I\u2019m proud to have it in my collection of divinatory books. Go to Amazon.com or directly to Fair Winds Press to order your copy today! <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

References<\/u><\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Dean, Liz. The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More. <\/u> Beverly, MA: Fair Winds Press, 2019. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

http:\/\/lizdean.info\/<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer’s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry and More on Amazon<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

***<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

About the Author:<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Polly MacDavid<\/b>\u00a0lives in Buffalo, New York at the moment but that could easily change, since she is a gypsy at heart. Like a gypsy, she is attracted to the divinatory arts, as well as camp fires and dancing barefoot. She has three cats who all help her with her magic.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Her philosophy about religion and magic is that it must be thoroughly based in science and logic. She is Dianic Wiccan but she gets along with a few of the masculine deities. She loves to cook and she is a Bills fan. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

She blogs at\u00a0<\/span><\/span>silverapplequeen.wordpress.com<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span>. She writes about general life, politics and poetry. She is writing a novel about sex, drugs and recovery. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Book Review The Divination Handbook The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More by Liz Dean Fair Winds Press 176 Pages \u00a0 I love little guidebooks like this. I must have well over a dozen of them. In each one, there\u2019s an overview of a half-a-dozen or so divination methods \u2013 sometimes more \u2013 and even though the information may often be more or less the same in all the books, they each have some nugget of enlightenment that the other books don\u2019t have \u2013 which is why I collect these books. And quite honestly, you can\u2019t have too many books! The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer’s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry and More is written by Liz Dean, an author, Tarot reader and divination teacher based in London, England. Her books include The Ultimate Guide to Tarot, A Thousand Paths to Mindfulness, and The Magic of Tarot, just to name a few. Her web site is HERE and it has information on all her books, reading the tarot, tarot spreads and much more. Check it out! The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More is published by Fair Winds Press, an imprint of The Quarto Group. They publish books on a variety of subjects, all clustered on the wholistic health spectrum. They also publish Oracle Cards for divination. The book is beautifully printed on shiny stock and has lovely pictures. For a slender book, it is packed with information. I advise you to read the Introduction. I know people who skip over Introductions and Prefaces, however, there is always important information in these opening sections, and the Introduction of The Divination Handbook is no different. Dean says right off the bat that if you are doing a divinatory reading to find out the future you have to remember that \u201cthe future is not fixed.\u201d (Dean, 9). Since we have free will, once we know our future, we can change that outcome. This is eminently important to remember! Another crucial point that she makes in the Introduction is about how to \u201cformulate your question\u201d (Dean, 9). She says that most people already \u201cknow the answer\u201d to what they\u2019re asking and what they\u2019re seeking is \u201cconfirmation\u201d which is beyond the scope of the reading. (Dean, 9). She suggests asking questions such as \u201cWhat can make me happy?\u201d or \u201cWhat do I need to know now?\u201d \u2013 questions that will lead to a \u201cbroader, more rewarding reading.\u201d (Dean, 9). I found this to be the most important part of the book \u2013 on the first page that I read. Chapter One is about divining with crystals. I own a fair amount of crystals but I had never thought of using them for divinatory purposes \u2013 not in the way Dean does! That was quite a revelation. The thing is, you\u2019d have to really invest in all kinds of crystals to make this kind of divination practice work and that might run into a financial problem for some of us. I personally only own some clear Quartz pieces, some Rose Quartz, a lovely little piece of Aventurine and a vial of Herkimer diamonds. My other crystals \u2013 my Malachite, my Onyx, my Garnet \u2013 are all on set within rings or hanging on pendants \u2013 where I want them to stay. However, if I am able to get a decent collection of crystals, this might be a cool way to start using my divinatory skills. And who doesn\u2019t like a nice collection of pretty stones? The next chapter is about using a pendulum. I\u2019ve had a pendulum for years and before I had a proper pendulum, I used a button on a string or one of my rosaries as a pendulum \u2013 just as my grandmother taught me. I was taught to ask simple yes and no questions and depending on how the pendulum swung, that is how you got your answer. The pendulum also told pregnant women if she was carrying a boy or a girl. What I learned in this book was how to use \u201cPendulum charts\u201d. I had never heard of Pendulum charts but they make perfect sense when you think about it! I particularly like the Chakra Chart on page 38 but Dean shows us how to create a Pendulum chart for any set of options. Chapter Three is dedicated to Runes and Chapter Four is Divination with Tea. Chapter Five is Palmistry. This is a subject in which I am quite interested. I wish I had more people in my life \u2013 with COVID-19, I am now completely solitary \u2013 so I could truly learn this divination method. I study my own hands but I think I might learn faster \u2013 and easier \u2013 if I had other people to practice upon. And there\u2019s a lot to learn! This chapter is chock-full of charts and diagrams. I understand why palm readers do nothing but read palms! Chapter Six is about the Tarot, which has always been my first and favorite form of divinatory preference. Dean gives clear, concise advice on how to read the cards \u2013 focusing on the question, \u201cWhat do I need to see?\u201d in regards to the situation that being examined. (Dean, 116). Again \u2013 I think this is probably the most important concept in this entire book \u2013 the framing of your divinatory question. The entire reading \u2013 whether it\u2019s with Tarot cards, crystals, tea leaves or what have you \u2013 stems from this all-important view. She shares three spreads, which are well-known to most of us who have been reading Tarot Cards for a length of time \u2013 the \u201cPast, Present, Future\u201d spread, with three cards, \u201cThe Week Ahead\u201d spread, using seven cards for each day of the week and a significator card, and of course, \u201cThe Celtic Cross\u201d spread. Like most \u201cCeltic Cross\u201d spreads, it\u2019s a bit different than ones in other books and I am excited to add it to my collection of \u201cCeltic Cross\u201d spreads in my Tarot notebook! Dean advises \u201ccleansing\u201d your deck in between readings by going through the deck and turning \u201cany reversed card the right way up\u201d. Next, she says, \u201cchoose one or both\u201d of these instant cleansing techniques: blowing on your deck as you flick through the cards or hold the card in one hand and with the cards facedown, \u201cknown out unwanted energies with a firm, single knock on top of the deck.\u201d (Dean, 120) I have to admit that in over thirty years of reading Tarot cards, I have never heard of doing this. But hey \u2013 you learn something new every day, right? So now I am going to go through all my cards and give them a thorough cleansing! Chapter 7 is Numerology, which makes sense, given that the Tarot and Numerology have so much to do with one another. To be sure, one does not have to know anything about Numerology to read Tarot cards, nor does one have to read Tarot cards to do good work with Numerology. However, the two disciplines go together like apple pie and vanilla ice cream, so it is proper that they are set together in this book. Like anything written about Numerology, Dean tells us how to add up our birth numbers to get our Life Path Number. One thing she mentions that I hadn\u2019t heard before was that to \u201ctake note of any repeating numbers in the date of the birth\u201d (Dean, 146) which indicate a secondary Life Path number. In my case, I have two 9\u2019s and two 1\u2019s, so that means I have two extra Life Path numbers. Which honestly explains a lot. To find our Destiny numbers, we need to know the full name on our birth certificate. Dean provides a chart to make this process easy: Our Soul numbers are calculated using only the vowels in our names; our Personality numbers are found by adding the consonants in our names. We can also add up the numbers for various nicknames or business names, as needed. By assembling all these numbers and then reading the portraits of the personalities of these numbers between 151 and 163, we can come up with a reasonable psychological profile of ourselves or anyone we wish to examine. We can also see if we will get along with other people \u2013 all based on our numerological profile! The last chapter is about scrying with a crystal ball. I have a crystal ball but it\u2019s been a long time since I have used it. Reading this chapter made me want to bring out my ball and use it again. One thing I liked was Dean\u2019s assertion that \u201ctradition suggests you begin a scrying session just before twilight\u201d \u2013 that works with my natural inclinations. The main question with scrying with a crystal ball is what does one see? Dean writes that \u201cyou may receive them in your mind rather than through an image on the ball\u201d (Dean, 172) so it is important to remember that you\u2019re probably not going to see images in the crystal like in \u201cThe Wizard of Oz\u201d or other movies. (But wouldn\u2019t that be cool?) All in all, The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More by Liz Dean is a fabulous little book, packed with information \u2013 much more than I could write about here! I couldn\u2019t recommend it more highly. I\u2019m proud to have it in my collection of divinatory books. Go to Amazon.com or directly to Fair Winds Press to order your copy today! References Dean, Liz. The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer\u2019s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry, and More. Beverly, MA: Fair Winds Press, 2019. http:\/\/lizdean.info\/ The Divination Handbook: The Modern Seer’s Guide to Using Tarot, Crystals, Palmistry and More on Amazon   *** About the Author: Polly MacDavid\u00a0lives in Buffalo, New York at the moment but that could easily change, since she is a gypsy at heart. Like a gypsy, she is attracted to the divinatory arts, as well as camp fires and dancing barefoot. She has three cats who all help her with her magic. Her philosophy about religion and magic is that it must be thoroughly based in science and logic. She is Dianic Wiccan but she gets along with a few of the masculine deities. She loves to cook and she is a Bills fan. She blogs at\u00a0silverapplequeen.wordpress.com. She writes about general life, politics and poetry. She is writing a novel about sex, drugs and recovery.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10005],"tags":[10346,10095,10081,10070,10299,10334,12535,10242,12534,10444,10075,12532,12533],"class_list":["post-23268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-author","tag-book","tag-crystals","tag-divination","tag-guide","tag-handbook","tag-liz-dean","tag-modern","tag-more","tag-palmistry","tag-review","tag-seers","tag-using-tarot"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23268"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23283,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23268\/revisions\/23283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}