The Family Arcana Card DeckWhat do you get when you mix a ghostly novella with a deck of cards? You get “The Family Arcana,” which is a deck of 52 cards (plus two Jokers) that can be played as any traditional card game, like Go Fish, Poker, Old Maid, or whatever.

The uniqueness comes with the fact that each card includes a snippet of a the life of an excruciatingly dysfunctional family, as told by the children living inside the decomposing farmhouse.

As you play the game, you read the snippet aloud. It doesn’t matter what order they are in. It doesn’t matter what the rules for reading cards are. Snippets consist of secrets, confessions, accusations, and other independent pieces of the story.

Author Jedediah Berry created his family from a dream. He regularly wrote ideas for this unfolding family tale on index cards. He soon discovered that he could shuffle the pieces and still manage to make a somewhat comprehensive story out of it.

Thus The Family Arcana came to be.

You can preorder a full deck for $12 from Ninepin Press’ Kickstarter campaign with additional gifts included at higher pledge levels. The campaign ends on March 19 and shipping is expected by August.