Short review: This is definitely a very good intermediate level book. If you know your basics, this book is a good step up. Even if you never intend to read for others and/or publicly (and many Tarot readers never do), you can get value from reading the book. This is a book I would buy for my personal library. I do recommend it for libraries that already collect Tarot and other esoterica. This should not be the first Tarot book for a library as it is not really for beginners, not without other basic guides. In the end, I am glad to have reader it, and it is one I will revisit to keep up my skills.

(A full detailed review with reading notes will be available on my blog.)

This is a really great resource for anyone looking to futher their tarot knowledge and start reading for others.

Very helpful, goes through diffrent scenarios, problem solving etc.

The writing is easy to read and understand. Author gets to the point of the activity and example. Personal experiences placed throughout. Different aspects of giving a reading given in the book.

An extensive and easy to follow guide to tarot reading, good for beginners and experienced readers alike.

Jenna Matlin delves into what tarot is, different uses for reading, and how to become a strong and compassionate reader. She offers insight into how to build an understanding with your deck, and how to better develop techniques.

Thank you to #NetGalley and Llewellyn Worldwide for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Excellent guide that I would have loved during the beginning stages of my tarot journey. There are lots of examples and references that will help as well, rather than just he standard one card reads etc I like how the author talks about using intuition for readings and doesn't stick to the standard definitions. A must have for beginners and even professionals.

Take the Hesitation out of Tarot.

Will You Give Me a Reading? takes tarot education and frames it in the lens of reading for others. Taking things step-by-step, Matlin discusses everything from self-doubt and nervousness to reading for friends, reading for money, AND dealing with negative feedback. I could NOT have hoped for a more comprehensive guide!

When I am ready to read for others, this is the only tool I will need. Hopefully it helps you with any questions you may be facing also.

[Thank you to NetGalley and Llewellyn Publications for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.]

A well written, easy to read book exploring tarot reading beyond definitions and spreads. I like that it got me thinking outside the box, on things like ethics, free will, and intuition. The author also addresses that not all tarot practices or methods are for everyone, and to take what info applies to you. Overall, a good tarot book.

Will You Give Me a Reading? By Jenna Matlin

Filled with valuable information for those interested in or already reading tarot for others – great resource that I would love to have had when I began reading my deck. The lists and hints, tips and activities, personal anecdotes with clarification, and abundance of information eventually sent me into overload and had me realizing this is a book that would best be read with time to spare and use to apply various ideas shared.

Having several tarot decks, spent time getting to know the cards as well as I could, and still feeling a bit lost…this book offered the suggestion of finding one word for each card in the deck to pull up when reading. There was also the idea of researching the various descriptors of cards and combining them, finding one detail on the card that speaks to you, and writing stories about the court cards to get to know them better…all of these ideas would have been useful to me in the past.

This is a book I will be asking my daughter to buy for me and one I look forward to using in the future because it has inspired me to get my decks out again, spend time with them reading what they have to say when asked a specific question.

Thank you to NetGalley and Llewellyn Publications for the ARC – This is my honest review.

5 Stars

Well written, Tarot book. If your values and concepts of tarot align with this author. It’s well worth the read. Remember not all tarot readers reads from the same belief systems.
She’s knowledgeable and sets someone who wants to deepen their tarot card abilities to succeed.

While this book is not totally for me being a secular reader it is well written. The “Readers Tips” and activities throughout the book are very helpful

Helpful for Beginners

Jenna Matlin begins by assuming the following about those of us reading this book:
1. Tarot is a deck of cards that have images on them.
2. Those images are symbols that describe the meaning or feeling of that card.
3. We use tarot to help us answer questions (even a general reading is asking a question).
4. We ask a question, shuffle the deck, then choose and place specific cards in front of us.
5. We read the images of each card, combining the messages of each into a story.
6. That story answers the question in some way.

She further states that our tarot cards want us to read with them, and not sit on a shelf all sad and lonely while we take another year to think about how to read them. Tarot reading is a practice, and it is only by practicing that we become the best readers we can be, tarot is a hands-on activity.

The author provides reader's tips, and a quick-start guide with a lot of helpful information. Additionally, she defines three skill sets that define, support, and empower us as readers while providing the best possible experience for our querents. These skills sets are:
1. Dealing with Criticism.
2. Practicing Empathy.
3. Honoring Boundaries.

The author provides the following common boundaries because as Tarot Readers we are not obliged to:
1. tell people you read tarot, even if they ask
2. prove yourself or pass “tests” of your skills and capabilities
3. read tarot how they want you to if you do it differently
4. read for someone just because they know you read tarot
5. read for every question and circumstance
6. use tarot to make someone feel better
7. be available for readings whenever they want one
8. read tarot if you don’t feel like it
9. read for exposure
10. keep reading past the time you had available because a querent
11. wants more
12. fix someone’s problem
13. be 100 percent accurate or 100 percent clear
14. change a reading (or add to a reading) to please a querent

She states that when we do not honor our own boundaries, resentment can set in, and we get in the way of the reading. That in our desire to do something to make someone else happy at the cost of our own well-being, we decrease our capacity to be the best reader we can be and a key aspect to boundaries is managing our own guilt when we deploy
them.

The author states that her goal, when facilitating tarot classes, is to get people reading within an hour of opening their first deck. Therefore, she provides six easy steps that should get one reading like a pro.

She discusses reading the tarots and different techniques in doing so in much detail, providing examples from her past reading based on the question being asked of you as the tarot reader. Some helpful tips she gives are: taking notes during readings, keeping small talk to a minimum - declining to talk about yourself too much until the session has ended, to a querent, even a friend. She states that how you talk about yourself or what is going on in your life may inadvertently influence the reading, and that reading time is special so make it sacred. She states that a tarot reader should allow querents to record sessions because it may help the querent by them replaying and listening for what they didn’t catch the first time.

This is a very good book with a lot of helpful information. Highly recommend.

I really found this book helpful as someone that has never read cards for someone else before, especially the information on ethics. Great read and highly recommend it. Will purchase for the library.

This book is a very helpful tool for those of us wanting to be more in tune and professional when reading tarot to others. I got a lot of insights and tips in this book and I am just so delighted with that. I also appreciate the section in here about ethics and free will which are not commonly talked about in books about esoteric topics (especially ethics). I highly recommend!

There are quite many books out there for reading Tarot, and I’ve read quite a few of them. What I like most about this one is that it addresses how to handle a reading that isn’t quite what the seeker wants to hear. It happens, after all, it’s in the cards. So many books guide you through reading the cards, but not how to handle a reading that isn’t positive and could leave the seeker angry or upset.

This is definitely a book to read if you are planning, or are, giving readings to others. You’ll be as pleased with this take on reading the cards as I am.

Thank you to Llewellyn Publications and NetGalley for this free ARC.

This was a great introduction to giving Tarot readings to not just yourself but to other people.