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.

***

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.

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