The Lunar Nomad Oracle is a Lenormand-based oracle deck with a dream-like, visionary aesthetic that’s surreal and almost, I want to say, Dadaist style to the art. It feels subversive, almost anarchical, and yet undeniably beautiful.

The deck art here has a Victorian-inspired digital photo-collage style, giving off a vintage feel, and yet through a point of view and aesthetic that’s wholly modern. For instance, there’s something fresh about the negative photography for the Mice card. Reading spreads with the Lunar Nomad Oracle is like visualizing a dream sequence. It’s beautiful.

I love, love, love the packaging here. You get a sturdy sleeve box that holds the deck and book set, but the deck itself has its own tuck box to keep all your cards in one place. Everything comes with a matte finish and the quality of this cardstock is a cartomancer’s dream.

The keyhole symbolism, peeking full moon, stars, and midnight blue coloring on the card backs is clever, perfect, and I feel like Shaheen Miro reads my mind in terms of my aesthetic preferences, then makes it happen in this deck. If I were to design a card back for this deck, honestly this keyhole art is exactly what I would have gone for. It’s evocative, it fits with the theme of the oracle deck, and the simplicity is powerful.

The first nine cards of the deck stay true to the Petit Lenormand deck structure. Love the imagery rendered for Card #3, Ship, by the way. The X-ray vision aesthetic in Coffin drives home the unsettling feeling that is the classic undertone of the card. The intentional play of dark and light across the cards is perfection.

Scythe has been changed to Shears and again here, cards 10 to 21 continue with the traditional Lenormand architecture. There’s an eccentric, almost erratic and slightly irreverent point of view that comes across through the imagery of the cards. I can’t pinpoint any defined style to the art, as it feels like a magical melting pot. You get the sense that even the conception of each card had to have been organic, pushed by the muses, and never by Shaheen Miro himself.

I love that two options are provided for Man and also, as shown in the photograph below, for Woman. That Book card is another one of my favorites. Again, the play of negative photography, a creative, almost radical use of dark vs. light is starting to feel like the artist’s trademark.

You get such a strong dark urban fantasy vibe, too. If I had to define, I might say this is a postmodern Lenormand.

Up to this point, the first 36 cards are a Petit Lenormand deck and if you want, you can separate out these cards only to read Lenormand style. But why would you do that when Miro has added such incredible and energetic cards to this oracle!

I love the inclusion of Aura, Bat, Umbrella, Familiar, and Seer. It almost feels like the five elements, too: Seer for Fire; Umbrella for Water; Bat for Air; Familiar for Earth; and Aura for the fifth element, Spirit.

Now let’s check out the companion guidebook.

I love the first-person point of view that the text is written in, forging an immediate vested interest in me in the deck creator. I intuit immediately that this deck is personal to Miro, that Lunar Nomad Oracle is not just an incredible divination tool, but it’s also trying to say something about the soul’s journey, self-actualization through the lunar self, about eclectic spirituality, and even how magic in our universe works.

Not to mention the guidebook is a great all-around card meanings text for the Lenormand. You get a description of the imagery on the card, which reveals the back story of the creator’s intentions. Then each entry delves into how the card can be interpreted in different scenarios.

Reading approaches are also instructed in the guidebook, rendering this deck set to be a complete package. Oh by the way, someone I adore, Theresa Reed, wrote the Foreword!

The Lunar Nomad Oracle enthralls. Production quality by Weiser is top-notch and I have zero complaints or criticisms to give about the packaging, the cardstock (an exquisite matte finish that I adore), the guidebook, I mean it’s exactly what I want in the production of a deck. I hope to see more oracle decks from Shaheen Miro in the future.

FTC Disclosure: In accordance with Title 16 of the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations Part 255, “Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising,” I received The Lunar Nomad Oracle from Weiser Books for prospective review. Everything I’ve said here is sincere and accurately reflects my opinion of the deck.