Cult of Tarot Forum

He's currently on hiatus until sometime this autumn, but he's been kind enough to leave some archived posts up, and they're wonderful. Tarot, Lenormand, astrology... https://abcartomancy.wordpress.com/tag/archived-posts/

IMHO, he's the best cartomancy writer we have. The blog occasionally gets renamed or moved, but it's well worth taking the trouble to keep up with this guy!

Thank you! I have his Lenormand book and it's imo the BEST. He really knows what he's talking about. Too many other authors discovered the Lenormand when the hype started and cook up tarot-y techniques that really confuse me. I'm not a great Lenormand reader so maybe I can't judge but that was my impression.

You're quite right, Nemia. I've been finding the Bjorn Meuris books complement his well if you need something more.

Your impression is spot on, Nemia!
I love the way he writes. Everything is well-researched, and he cites his sources. It's scholarly, but readable and never dry. He approaches the Lenormand tradition as a folklorist, which is the correct way to look at it, IMHO! He's fluent in French, and so can read things that would require me typing whole books into google translate. He's intelligent, logical, and he's a good, ethical person. Being ethical may not seem like something that is a requirement for writing on card reading, but it IS.

Ethics are sorely lacking in the meretricious world of card reading. I'm not calling out anyone here, but what I am saying is that we are often seen as marks who will buy anything. Sheep to be sheared. And then you have the Instant Experts who are elevated to god status because they have a youtube channel, or a bad book, or whatever.

And yes, there was a gold rush mentality with Lenormand in 2012-2013, and a lot of bad stuff got put out there. Some of that was pressure from publishers ("Make it about Lenormand!" to people who were known as experts in modern intuitive Tarot. Just because it's pasteboard doesn't mean it's the same thing!)

Andy has always stood his ground. He is a more peaceful and sensitive person than I am (internet dust-ups don't disturb me, my Scots/Irish loves a good scrap and my motto is "Don't worry, it's the internet!") It disturbs him when he's treated badly online, but he seems to abide by the axiom "Wrong is wrong, no matter who does or says it." He stands up for what's right no matter what the consequences.

And I respect that.

He's accomplished in various reading systems other than Lenormand, like classical astrology, TdM, Belline...probably some others I can't calll to mind at the moment.

Top tier, not to be missed!

He's also a top-drawer palm reader, apparently. And so generous.

No, it's gone!

Apparently Andy has gotten a lot of bad vibes from some fellow cartomancers over the years, so, perhaps he's tired of engaging. I know nothing of this sordid history and can't for the life of me think why anyone would have a problem with Mr. B.

Anyway, I hope he's OK.

What a loss. Terrible.

devin wrote: ↑14 Jun 2019, 13:54 No, it's gone!

Apparently Andy has gotten a lot of bad vibes from some fellow cartomancers over the years, so, perhaps he's tired of engaging. I know nothing of this sordid history and can't for the life of me think why anyone would have a problem with Mr. B.

Anyway, I hope he's OK.

That's so sad. I can't believe that such ugliness can happen between card readers. Andy is such a kind guy who shares his wisdom with the whole world.

Just to clarify, I think the ugliness was a few years back.

I doubt it's permanent, at least I hope not.
He takes blogs down every now and then, reworks things, and shows up with a new blog. It's happened before.

Hello does anyone have any further info of the "division" technique taught in the book. I'm unsure how to ref the columns and rows. Thanks.

the word division isn't ringing bells. Can you give me a page or chapter?

Charlie Brown wrote: ↑07 Sep 2019, 15:49 the word division isn't ringing bells. Can you give me a page or chapter?

Am waiting to see the citations on this as well....

And for anyone who doesn't know: Andy's blog is back up and he's been posting regularly
https://abfortuneteller.home.blog/

Hello
In the chapter where he talk of how he does grand tableau. The heading is "Division" he talks of how to split the tableau into days so that you can predict when things will happen. Sorry can't give page number as my kindle version does not have page numbers.

Ok. I see it now. I might be wrong, but I don't think he actually uses this technique very much.

For others, it's p. 156 in my edition.

It is only used when you want to do GT but have it cover a short duration, like one month.

The tableau is divided into the four separate sections as shown in the illustration.

Each division focuses on a quarter of the time frame, so approximately one week.

I don't see anything there indicating how to look for a specific day within the tableau. However, there is a small timing section in the appendix.

How do the divisions work? Is it 1 card from the row together with the 2 from the column read together? Or the whole row with 2 cards from the column read together?

All the cards in a particular division are read together. I'm getting the impression that you haven't done a lot of tableau reading. This will make more sense when you're more experienced with the Grand Tableau. At that point, I doubt you'll want to do division anyway. For a one month reading, just use the 3 x 3.

The one thing I don't like about Andy's book is the ordering. He focuses on the GT first when it's the last thing you should be attempting. Start out with the 3 card lines until you know the cards pretty well. Throw in an occasional 5-card line once in awhile. Then learn the 3 x 3 and do more 5-card lines. When you can do 3 x 3s without much trouble, that's when you'll probably be comfortable to start up with the GT.

Remember, he presents division as an auxiliary technique and, based on following him for some time, I don't think he uses it much. It isn't really important.

Many thanks, you are right I'm not very experienced. I'll follow your advice. Thanks.

The division technique is something one uses; however, it was never particularly popular with the first round of students. It is taught in workshops, et cetera. But as one is not the best writer, or as eloquent as my peers, I have never had much success teaching it in the printed format.

Once the cards are displayed, the cartomante lets their eyes scan the board. Look for standout strings of two, three, or four cards horizontally and vertically. Having finished, go back and look at the rows - each row is a line of sight, and will often detail mains events and occurrences. Look and see how those standout strings fit in their division. The columns often relate to the background or context of the row, and one will often zig-zag (card 1 with card 10, card 2 with card 9, et cetera).

In my experience, the division is also a critical timing tool, and the overlap between the different sections tell you when events will peak. Lots of people think all-future draws are hard to time, but they are the easiest. It is not a traditional Lenormand technique but is instead something my earliest teachers did with playing-cards (which the Lenormand Oracle is).

Thank you for the clarification. It is much appreciated.

Has Andy completely scrubbed his online blog? I can’t find a working link to his old blog or the site for the new one.

It appears so.

That’s disappointing! I’m glad I have his book but the blog was so interesting. Guess it’s the way back machine for now.