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The Book: The Book of Magic by Bruce Smith, subtitled, 'Classic tricks of the Great professionals'

Cost: Cover price £9.99 but currently only £2.99.

From: The Works. As their web site isn't active at the moment, you'll have to go to a real shop to buy this! It's published in Canada as well as the UK so our Canadian members might be able to get copies.

Review: The Works are in a state of flux at the moment and are in administration yet seem to be offering more and more bargains every week! I spotted this book last month and figured that for £2.99 it would be worth a read. I confess the name Bruce Smith doesn't mean anything to me (yet!) but the names of the magical consultants certainly do - Mark Paul and Anthony Owen. There are four sections: Great Card Tricks, Great Money Tricks, Great Handkerchief Tricks and Great Rope and Ring Tricks. Each section starts with a Glossary of terms and there are plenty of large, clear line drawings to show and explain all the tricky bits, very similar in many respects to the Mark Wilson style of book. Some of the 'tricks' are really just gags, some are really tired old cheapo trick set standard but ignoring that aspect, there's a lot of real magic included and there's likely to be plenty to interest Magicians of most skill levels. Obviously it's not possible to say much about each individual trick but the chapter contents are:

Cards:
Glossary, Odd one out, The Seven Pile Trick, Duck and Deal, Joker's Wild, Scarlet Pimpernel, The Glide Move, Observation Test, Cutting the Aces, You are the Magician, Card on Window, The Next Card I turn over, the Stack, Las Vegas Poker Deal, Torn and Restored Card, Card through Handkerchief, The Crimp, Magnetised cards.

Money:
Glossary, Jumping Coin, Vanishing Note, The French Drop, The Pinch Vanish, Multiply Your Money, Miser's Dream, Making Money, Coin up through Hand, Penetrating Note, Holey Coin Fold, Into This Air, EZ Coin vanish, Te vanishing banknote, Two coins, The roll down, Flying Coin.

Handkerchief:
Glossary, Dissolving Knott, Vanishing Wand, The Secret Helper, Hypnotised Hanky, The Serpent Silk, Glorpy, Hanky through Hanky, Houdini Silk, Penetrating Handkerchief, Appearing silk hanky, The organ pipes, Wine glass production, Colour prediction, Silk production and change, Broken and restored match, Twentieth Century Silks.

Rope and Ring:
Glossary, Another one handed knot, Quick knot, The Pop off knot, Quick Slip knot, Appear-ring, Knotty Bracelet, Triple knots, The sliding knot, Throwing a knot, Buttonhole release, Double escape, The string and straw, Ring restoration, Bangle release, The captive knot, Through the thumb, Ring and band, Cutting a girl in two.

You'll recognise some classic names in that lot so, all in all, quite a respectable selection.

Overall: 254 A5 sized pages in soft back binding, clear print and illustrations, and for the money involved well worth adding to any magician's library.

Rating: 8/10.

Whilst in town today, I saw "The Works" and decided to wander in, not only to find the Bruce Smith book (for £1.99!) but also Mark Wilson's Cylopedia of Magic.

Basically, a cut down version of the Complete Course. It has over 200 effects/sleights inside... This was also £1.99!

So, next time you walk past your local "The Works", pop in and see what bargains they may have.