• Creator: Antonio Tourino
• Publisher: Star & Strength – https://starandstrength.com/product/star-and-strength-tarot-deck-for-beginners/
• Publication Date: March 2026
• RRP: £14.99
• Reviewer: Gwen Enstam @goldenpomt on IG

Like many readers, I’ve been interested in Tarot since I was in my teens. But it was more recently that I focused on learning how to really understand the cards, and how they work together in a reading. So, I remember what it was like to come to the deck with only what I’d seen on TV as a reference and a Little White Pamphlet in my hand. Even with the few books that were available, there is that interruption in focus – to stop, look the card up, study the meaning, look back at the card, etc. At the beginning, it makes a difference.

The Star and Strength Tarot would have been very welcome as I was creating all those new associations in my mind between image and meaning. And it’s so much fun now to look at The Star and Strength from both perspectives – as someone new to Tarot, and as someone who now forges a confident, independent path of my own.

First, the basics: the Star and Strength Tarot is illustrated with images from the Rider Waite Smith (RWS), which is ideal for new readers. Say what you will about the RWS, but it is the template upon which the vast majority of decks today are based, so starting there gives us a solid foundation in structure and meaning.

The background design is very simple and unobtrusive, and that’s a good thing because the theme of this deck is having all the information you need at your fingertips, and that means a certain amount of text on each card: the Upright meaning; Upright keywords; Reversed meaning, Reversed Keywords; and an associated Yes, No, or Maybe.

For someone new to Tarot, the keywords and descriptions given on the Star and Strength cards are very helpful. It would work well in conjunction with the RWS itself – perhaps drawing cards from the Star and Strength and then drawing the same cards from the RWS and spending time with both, to become more accustomed to ‘seeing’ the meanings without the text.

I also really like that the deck comes with two cue cards we can keep handy while reading. One gives keywords for numbers & the court cards, and the other gives details on the area of each of the suits (Wands, Cups, Swords, and Pentacles) & the Major Arcana. They both give solid, traditional information for working with numerology and the Elements.

The Star and Strength Tarot comes in a shrink-wrapped dark steel-blue tuck box, with a QR code on the back that you can scan to get the deck’s guide on your phone. But there is much more here than additional meanings for the cards. The guide to the deck is freely available on the website even without the QR code, along with a ‘Complete Beginner’s Guide to Tarot’ (12 lessons), ‘How to Read Tarot Cards for Beginners’, and ‘Best Spreads for Beginners’. There is also a search bar for each Tarot card which lets you ask for its general meaning, its meaning as ‘feelings’ and ‘how someone sees you’, and you can register for a free pdf on the Celtic Cross that explains how to connect the cards in a reading. It’s a very impressive website.

I tried the Past, Present, Future spread:

As you can see in one of the images above, the card backs are not reversible, i.e. if you draw and place your cards face-down, you will be able to tell which are upright and which are reversed. A slightly more bothersome issue for me is that the cards are slippery to shuffle. The extra plastic coating might be there to support the structure of the card, which is quite thin compared to my other decks. Having said that, for £14.99, it’s a good starter deck.

In addition to the meanings, which are thoughtful and insightful, the cards each give Yes, No, or Maybe for both upright and reversed meanings. In principle, this could be useful in adding another layer of meaning, but it’s tricky to sum up a card with any of those options. And in this case, the Yes/No/Maybe options don’t appear to have been dealt with as carefully as the rest of the deck. For example, on the Page of Wands, the reversed text is:

Fear is holding you back, and you’re stuck overthinking. This card is a nice reminder that confidence comes from action, not waiting. Start where you are and just take one step forward – it’s enough.

Great. But the advice is ‘No’ … and the message here is clearly not a No.

Some cards have ‘Maybe’ as a third option, which is a good idea because it allows for some nuance, but unfortunately it isn’t always applied well either. I will also mention The Tower, a challenging card for any reader, which I was disappointed to see categorised as a No in both upright and reversed. The idea of giving a one-word summation of a card might work, but to be fair to the card and to a new reader, we really need more, and more subtle, options.

The Star and Strength Tarot works best alongside its website, which is a treasure trove of lessons, exercises, and advice. It is a good deck for beginners and offers the kind of support that I would have loved to have had when I was first coming to grips with the Tarot. It is not a work of art – but it’s not supposed to be. It is designed to be a faithful workhorse deck that keeps things simple and straightforward, which is so important at the start of Tarot study, when it can all be so frustrating and overwhelming. I would be happy to recommend this deck – and website – to a friend who was just starting out with Tarot, as a tool to help them learn and grow in confidence as a Tarot reader.

To purchase the deck, please visit:

Star And Strength Tarot Deck For Beginners