Writing and Call For Marketing Help

Sep 19, 2023 | Writing

A couple of things, the first of which is written in the hope that the Google bot finds it and indexes it for the benefit of other writers; the second is a call for help.

I have a short story on the go at the moment, making its way towards first draft stage. It is based around a tarot reading using the Pamela Colman Smith deck, also known as the Rider-Waite deck. I couldn’t decide whether or not the names of tarot cards should be capitalised (I capitalised them in the rough draft but had a crisis of confidence when revising.) The only reference I could find was to the Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS) that says the names of cards should not be capitalised. But that refers to a standard pack and besides, whatever American editors think, CMOS is not the be all and end all of style especially for fiction written in the UK. So I sent a message to some editor friends:

I hope you don’t mind this random question, but it’s something that’s bugging me: the names of tarot cards – Hierophant, the Tower, Six of Wands, Five of Pentacles etc.: Should they be capitalised? I think CMOS says not (for a standard pack of cards: queen of hearts, five of spades), but it doesn’t ‘look’ right.  Context: a short story based around a tarot reading where the cards are named as they’re drawn..

One of the editors put the query onto a group chat. The unanimous verdict was Yes: the names of tarot cards should be capitalised. I received two substantive responses that say more or less the same thing:

My instinct would be to capitalise – they carry more socio-cultural and specific weight these days than playing cards do.

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I’ve checked all my (many) Tarot books and they all cap the card names for both the major and minor arcana.

Some cap ‘the’ in the name; others don’t. I personally prefer the Tower to The Tower, but it’s a style choice for you and the author to make.

The minor arcana cards would also be capped: Six of Swords or (a/the) Three of Wands, etc.

The Tarot is not like a pack of playing cards – each card has a specific meaning or symbolism attached to it, so the names and suits take on extra importance in that regard. Unlike in a pack of playing cards where the name of the card is simply a description. At least, that’s my logic for why the card names are capped in Tarot.

So there you have it: should the names of tarot cards be capitalised? Yes they should.

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The call for help.

I am grateful to every person who has bought or read a copy of one of my books, but my lovely readers remain a niche minority and I haven’t yet purchased my writing retreat in northern Portugal. I’ve written elsewhere about the greatest single thing that one needs to source and that is luck: marketing is a process of generating luck. When I started self-publishing, I thought about TikTok as a promotional tool. I started an account (link below) but haven’t done anything with it, partly because of concerns about the app itself.

@ianburdon

In the past few days I’ve revisited the app (I had it disabled for a long time) and am actively considering how to use it. So, if anyone reads this who is or who knows a TikTok creator willing to guide me through stuff, please get in touch either in comments or through the email link in the sidebar (and yes, I know I need to update my profile on the app).

Thanks