- Book Title: Tarot Tableau Revolution –
- A Breakthrough System to see the Whole Story in Your Readings
- Author: Maria Alviz Hernando
- Publisher: Red Wheel / Weiser – Product Page
- Published: UK – November 2025 / Kindle – October 2025
- RRP: GBP £16.99 / US $18.95
- ISBN: 978-225-2930
- Reviewed by: Margo Benson
I was thrilled to review Maria Alviz Hernando’s first book, Tarot Tableau Revolution, having been familiar with her work for sometime. As several students on the TABI Intermediate Course will know, I am particularly fond of reading in tableau, and it’s great to have such a thorough examination of this technique in one book.
Maria is well known in the cartomancy community. She is a director of the World Divination Association, a popular speaker at conferences and summits, as well as offering her own online courses in divination.
Reading in tableau differs from other large layouts as, instead of interpreting individual cards in a particular placement, the reader looks at the whole picture and detects the flavours and nuances therein. The theme behind a spread can be sensed swiftly, before diving deeper into the reading.
The book opens with a warm and generous Forward by Mary K. Greer, which immediately tantalises the reader into discovering the art of the tableau. Maria then gives a solid introduction into what to expect, including thoughtful insights into predictive reading. She also likens the tableau to an actual painting or puzzle, where one needs to build layers in order to ‘see’ the whole.
It is then divided into three sections:
- Part I: Reading in Layers
- Part II: Tableau Reading
- Part III: Reading in Different Contexts
Each section builds a narrative leading towards the tableau itself, taking you through the cards’ core meanings, the elements associated with them, colours, body language, numerology, and auspicious and inauspicious placements. There are exercises and examples showing all of these. This isn’t a book devoted to the meanings of the cards, but the author cleverly includes meanings and interpretations as she explains each layer and example.
Maria’s ‘Flagship’ tableau is the Nine Card Tableau, or Box of Nine. This is a favourite of mine too, so I was eager to get stuck in. Maria explains everything from the initial look at the ‘Spine of the Tableau’ (top left card, centre card, bottom right card), to knighting (a cartomancy term following the movements of the Knight on a chessboard), to honing your timing with the past, present, future and future plus.
After the Nine Card Tableau, we are introduced to larger Tableaux – the 5×5 Tableau, the Major Arcana Tableau, and the technique of reading with Houses, which will be familiar to readers of Lenormand, and adds a fascinating dimension to the tarot.
It’s unusual (and very welcome) to read a whole section devoted to context. Maria covers an array of situations from relationships to careers, to health and spirituality. There are examples throughout and the reader can relate immediately to any question and situation. The level of detail included in just under 200 pages, without baffling the reader, shows just how talented the author is!
I honestly couldn’t put the book down – Maria’s style is chatty and engaging, bringing refreshing enthusiasm to tarot readers of all standards and levels. I highly recommend it.
Go to Margo’s exclusive interview with author Maria Alviz Hernando
To purchase the book directly from the publisher, please visit this LINK
An except from the book is available at this LINK
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