It's that time of year when people are looking for gifts - including for tarot fans! This post is to help people know where they can find genuine copies of Tattoo Tarot, its follow up book, Tattoo Tarot Journal, The Tarot Colouring Book, and the Movie Tarot deck/booklet set. 

Why would you need to know? Because there have been illegally printed, fake versions of Tattoo Tarot advertised around the internet and - astonishingly - sometimes offered at a much more expensive price than the genuine article! For instance, TT deck set currently retails on Amazon UK at around £11.99, but a seller is offering a fake version at £17.55. Ouch!

Hopefully, most people won't be duped into a purchase of a deck selling fraudulently, but if you are, you might like to look to trading standards and see if you can obtain a refund. 

To be able to be sure if a deck is a fake, a telltale clue will be that it very likely won't have the specially prepared booklet with it; nor will it arrive in the beautiful, lidded gift box specially commissioned by LKP (it will just be in a cheap, flip top box like you get with an everyday card pack - only the seller will have likely stolen the art from the original design, to copy). All the purchase will have, unfortunately, is a set of illustrated cards, not on the original card stock, and with no instructions on how to use them nor definitions of their specific meanings (which differ in some regards to some modern decks). Also, if you are offered a 'PDF' version of the booklet, that will be a fake - being sold illegally with no respect of author copyright - since no PDF version exists! The information appears in a printed, bound, glossy, colour booklet.

So, here are the main, easy to spot clues on how you can know if you are looking at a genuine version of Tattoo Tarot online, which you might be considering buying for yourself or another - and you can find such a valid set via the following link: https://amzn.to/3oUTNH9 Genuine Tattoo Tarot Deck

1)  The cards will be sold within a gift box format, NOT a typical, flip-top card casing, but a sturdy box with a removable lid. The sort of box that looks beautiful on a tarot reading table! This box has a red inside lining with a deep well for the cards.

2) The tarot set comes complete with a glossy, colour-printed booklet bound with a stitched seam.

3) The publisher will be named as Laurence King Publishing. 

4) The illustrator/artist will be named as Megamunden. 

5) The author/writer will be named as Diana McMahon Collis. 

6) The deck will be sold at a reasonable price (for a tarot deck). 

7) The deck won't advertise itself as containing any PDF element (the booklet is only offered as part of the set and in printed form - it fits neatly inside the box). 

Please also find links below to the other genuine tarot items mentioned above, all published by Laurence King Publishing - part of the Orion Books group: 

The follow-up book, Tattoo Tarot Journal, which includes extended meanings for the cards and lots of spreads - with plenty of room to practise and record your own (as it's a journal format); a soft-bound, wipe-clean style A5 size book with a very pretty cover! https://amzn.to/3r43qG4 Tattoo Tarot Journal

The Tarot Colouring Book, which also features expanded Tattoo Tarot card illustrations, with extra, black ink design details - as well as textual information about tarot art in history, for colouring inspiration (my bit of research for the project!) This usually retails at about £6 at the time of writing this post: https://amzn.to/3FK2uuu The Tarot Colouring Book

Movie Tarot, the name of which is probably self-explanatory, but features characters from popular movies. Again, this mentions Diana McMahon Collis as the author - but with Natalie Foss as the illustrator: https://amzn.to/3l4EcDL Movie Tarot

Please feel free to share the above links with anyone who wants to access genuine tarot products. I love the idea of #realtarot on social media! Please share this hashtag phrase if you're a fan of genuine tarot decks and want to help support the illustrators and authors. We all really appreciate it and this helps to keep genuine art and design going, as well as respecting the intellectual property of author and publisher copyrights.