From the Alley: The Misery Tarot seeks to be born from the deep wound in our hearts. Through blood and rust, the Misery Tarot crawls from the dark. A tarot to traverse our trauma and pain, uniquely reading over the top of other tarot decks.
Before the altar of the twisted nail, we bow our heads in prayer. We entered the wound, we feel the pain, we know it is real, this weight is heavy.
But this is a burden we needn't carry forever. A chill hand comes from the dark, and we take it.
We will walk the museum of our pain, follows its path through our veins, and emerge from the wire stronger for the survival. It shouldn't be this way, we shouldn't need to be strong.
But we will be, so we can survive. Tomorrow is another day, and we are no more or less than yesterday.
Welcome to the Misery Tarot. At the Altar of Misery, we will read this wicked and twisting deck to explore difficult topics, perform hard readings for querents who need hard answers, and perform our shadow work so that we can cleanse ourselves before other workings.
The Misery Tarot is a dark deck that deals with trauma, pain, suffering, and grief. It is made to be read on its own, or more often as an overlay deck. First, deal out your reading with your normal use deck, then use one of the Overlay Spreads from the guidebook to inform the reading further by grief, trauma, and the healing path through them.
The Misery Tarot is, to be fair, barely a tarot deck. It has 100 cards, after all. This deck is based on the concept of a tarot, but lost in its own oracle journey. It has a Major Arcana group, then Suits of cards. But this structure is the closest to tarot the deck itself is. Still, consider it a companion to tarot. It will be best read with another tarot deck, and you will find it has its own following journey for the Majors, and the Suits have meaning to the numbers that resonate across all the Suits.
The Exhibit: The Major Arcana
The Major Arcana is in upheaval, instead replaced with The Exhibit. The pathway through the pains we take to understand them, to witness them, to respect them. This 21 card set follows the path of the Victim into the Ruined Wound, to the Nailed Altar, and forward. There are trials on the journey, foes, other victims left behind on the road of misery. Ultimately it leads you to the Hole, the Enemy, and the rise into the Light.
These are a journey of a different kind through a bloodied and rusted hell, a museum of our pains.
From the wandering souls we meet on the path in The Lost, to the loss of our safety in The Burning Home, to the solace of the Weeping Mother, and on to The Enemy we must overcome. This is a set of cards that will give you insight into the pains and sorrows you have experienced, how others have treated you, and your journey to return to the world of the living.
The Suits of Misery
In our Suits, we have an odd number of minors. In place of the traditional Wands-Swords-Pentacles-Cups, we have instead 7 Suits and a Joker Suit.
We begin with the Suit of Wounds, the Joker Suit. This is the pain of the trauma, also known to be The Mistake and Helplessness. This suit is 2 cards, the Marquis and the Jester.
Then we enter the 7 Suits proper. Each has a 1-7, with a 0 which is the suit's Folly, and a square, which is their House. Their courts are 2 cards, being the Denizen and the Ruler of the house. We begin with The Suit of Blades, founded in brutality, shocking cuts, agitation and danger. It is Shock and Denial. Then into The Suit of Wire, intuition, avoidance. It is Pain and Guilt. From the wires into The Suit of Flesh, raw emotion, feeling. It is Anger, Bargaining, and Shame. Falling into The Suit of Rot, materialness, food, decay. It is Depression and Unreality. Then into The Suit of Nails, precise, focus, planning. It is the Upward Turn. Building into The Suit of Rust, tradition, the temple. It is Reconstruction, Working Through. Until we come to The Suit of Blood, exchange, cost, hunger. It is Acceptance & Hope.
Learn more about the cards in these suits, and their formation, as we enter the journey. Enoch will be completing new cards constantly as we move through the deck and the funding, and I will share them with you as they come out.
The Misery Tarot is made with the intent of being used with other decks. It can be read on its own, used on its own, but that is best reserved for very specific tarot readings and shadow work. Here, it is being used with the Alleyman's Tarot. While it is roughly in the Celtic Cross, I have realized over the years that the way I read it is not the way most people do.
In this reading, The Last Round (by Kit Rockatansky) is our internal influences, our thoughts and happenings. We are imagining the hard last round at the moment, feeling like we're down to our silver bullet. I see it informed from the past (2 of Wands by Alex Kelly) by The Nailed Altar, and from the future (The Magician by Roberto Papavero Crusca) by The Enemy. We made an informed decision in the past during our wayfinding to embark on a hard journey, knowing there would be pain, struggle, perhaps even suffering. The future of embodying our full selves feeds into the Enemy and the Last Round, who work very well together.
Simply put, we set out on our journey with an intention, and the silver bullet we hold to our chest is meant for a target. When we stand on our own two legs in our power, we will realize we have crafted just the tool we needed to pierce the heart of our troubles, and then we can move forward for real, fully realized in our space.
Similarly, our external influences (The Joker in reverse by Christian Ellingstad) are informed from the past by The Demons, and the future by The Chained Door. I see the obstacle that we remove being a door we have long thought locked, and our impetus for this journey and path being the nagging voices of ourselves or others who doubted what we could do.
Now, this isn't the full reading, but already you can see how having a secondary deck focused on the journey through difficulty, and the difficulty itself, can help inform a reading and add additional understanding. This is the most basic Overlay Spread I have suggested, the X. You can also lay a card cross the core card of the reading, but typically in a Celtic Cross there is already a card in that space.
$5 A Goblin's Thanks This is a way for you to back the project without getting anything, just to show your support for an independent creator! I appreciate you!
$60 Blood & Rust: The Misery Tarot This gets you the full 100-card tarot deck and guidebook in a 2-piece box. This is all you need to experience the deck and use it in your practice.
$120 The Twisted Collection: Deluxe Edition This gets you the Misery Tarot and all the goodies. From a 5-dice set of glow in the dark dice to a journal to track your readings and journey, to a tarot card holder to hold a card each day for you to meditate on, art prints, and more, this set has a unique box that holds all the items together.
$400 All the Divination Tools! This gets you the Deluxe Edition of the Misery Tarot, as well as a copy of the Alleyman's Tarot with boosters, the three new Alleyway Oracles decks, and the 2nd Edition of the Publishing Goblin's Oracle Dice!
ADDONS
$60 More Misery: The Tarot and Guide An extra copy of the deck and guidebook.
$120 Another Deluxe Set This gets you an extra copy of the Deluxe Edition set.
$15 The Black Lantern Dice Set This set of 5 oracle dice glow in the dark and come with a little white book guide, explaining how to use them over tarot readings, or with your oracle dice sets. **This comes in the Deluxe Set**
$20 The Dark Path Reading Journal This reading journal features a black foil front cover and has all the space you need to write down your readings and journey on the path of growth. **This comes in the Deluxe Set**
$30 Community Copy You unlock a community copy for the pool. This gives people who can't afford it a chance to get a copy!
$30 A Goblin's Signature An add-on this time, you can get any tier and grab this to get your set signed! The cost is mostly the extra postage and shipping materials to get it to me then to you.
$45 The Publishing Goblin's Oracle Dice 2nd Edition This 22-dice oracle dice set comes in a small black bag, accompanied by the reading guide and the double sided reading cloth, it's everything you need to begin divining through dice.
$115 The Alleyman's Tarot Set The original Alleyman's tarot, a mis-matched, record breaking, award-winning deck of 137 cards, all licensed from other decks and artists. This set comes with the deck, the guidebook, and the four booster packs, adding 59 more cards to your behemoth of a deck!
Sometimes, people see amazing things they wish they could own, but remember their bills and empty bank account. They simply can't afford it right now. And maybe that's almost always the case, maybe it's just true right now. In any case, I believe that some of the people in the world who need what I make the most simply cannot afford it.
So I am a big supporter of Community Copies.
If you find you want this deck, but cannot afford it at the moment for any reason? Sign up for the List here.
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At this time, we are looking to ship as early as June 2025, but that may move back as we get closer to completion. The official ship date will be updated as we get closer to complete, and all backers will be made aware in regular monthly updates after the project ends.
Shipping is not locked in at this time, but is estimated in this spreadsheet. Please bear in mind weight of items may change by the time we are done and change the estimates, as will the global shipping situation.
**Shipping is not being charged with your pledge, but will be added to your order in the pledge manager closer to the actual shipping date, to make it as accurate as possible.**
I'm Seven, the Publishing Goblin. In 2021 I made the Alleyman's Tarot, and in it, I included cards I made for decks that didn't exist. The Bogeyman was one such card, from the 'unreleased' Misery Tarot, which now I am realizing with the help of Enoch Duncan.
I am a queer independent artist and publisher, and I believe now more than ever, that we all need to support our independent artists. It is only with your help that my ideas can come to life, and be shared to the world. I never forget that. I do everything myself, but I love to bring in illustrators or artists to help bring things to life.
Enoch Duncan is an illustrator of the creepy and strange, and has been setup to illustrate this deck for well over a year already. Now excited to finally realize the deck! You can find things from Enoch here: https://linktr.ee/0ddoblivion
Refunds I will refund any pledges within 30 days of the campaign's finish date no questions asked, from January 2nd to February 2nd 2025. After that time, no refunds will be granted for any reason, and if you choose not to fill out your survey or pay shipping on time, your pledged amount will be considered a donation towards the project.
Shippingand Fulfillment We will be charging shipping costs closer to actual fulfillment. On this project, that means it could well be a year or a year and a half away. That means you are not being charged for it now, or for VAT or IOSS or any other taxes or fees unique to your country. That will be done closer to the shipping date. You will not receive your items if you do not pay shipping and any other relevant taxes or fees, and you will not receive a refund for your original pledge if you choose not to pay the shipping costs. This notice is here from day 1 of the campaign.
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*Thiswill be made clear in updates when we know for sure that we're moving to shipping, and will be clarified in multiple updates prior to starting the 30 day final reward claim timer.
Damagedor Missing Items, Lost or Misdelivered Packages You will have 30 days after your package arrivesto you to report to [email protected] if you need replacement items or have missing items in your order. For packages that go missing, you will have 45 days after the item is sent (60 for international packages) to report lost or misdelivered packages to have us resend or follow up on the items.
Backersare responsible for providing proper and up to date email addresses on Backerkit, and for reading updates as they come out to inform them of this information and the deadline dates. Tracking info will be automatically sent to provided email addresses, and it is the backer's responsibility to followup on their packages should problems arise.
Backing this project is a pledge of support to the project itself, it is not the purchasing of items. I will be doing everything I can to deliver all pledged items as part of fulfilling this project with your help, and have a track record of a dozen plus projects of doing so, but there is no 100% guarantee that you'll receive your items with crowdfunding. By pledging you are recognizing this and agreeing to it.
