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I'm giving up most card magic I think I don't know how long I'll last. But I'm moving on to the more hard hitting magic of Mentalism, I have most of the beginnings down (Thanks for the helpful post Craig Browning) and now I need help from Luke Jermay material owners. I have a choice between skullduggery and coral fang, which one is better in your opinions.

I need to know soon so I can either keep or cancel my bidding on ebay.

Thanks,

Ian The Magic-ian

neither...

steer clear of any of that for at least a good couple of years in my opinion...

13 steps by corinda, Practical Mental Magic by annemann, and Karl Fulves self-working mental magic ...

honestly - it may not be what you want to hear, but please trust in that advice - because if you steam into his work without a decent background knowledge of the basics you'll struggle...

remember when you started off in card magic? didnt you ease yourself in at first? do the same but more so with mentalism...

dunno if that's what you wanted to hear, but ultimately the choice is yours...

or you could buy both of your books and learn the hard way!

good luck though

That's not what I wanted to hear but I'll trust your advice. Thanks!

Without wanting to sound like too much of an old fart - and believe me, this applies to everyone and is in no way aimed at you specifically - how long exactly have you spent studying the groundworks laid out by Craig?

More specifically - he suggests studying Anneman and/or Corinda for at least six months.

I personally believe a serious student needs no other resources outside of these during the first six months of their personal study and even then, the supplemental materials should only be materials that help them in refining the skils and techniques outlined in these two tomes.

I agree entirely with that.
At the IMS mentalism night I performed three pieces - one of which was not in either of the two books, but was a tool with which I could use a technique learnt in Corinda.
Another of the three was one using a peek wallet, but then a peek wallet is really just a fancy way of using a window envelope (outlined in Corinda).
The third and final piece which I closed my act with was taken diretly from Anneman with virtually no changes made to the routine as outlined in the book.

At the Pentacle Club magic evening, I performed three different pieces - one of which was a throwaway gag (which was well received), one of which used a principle from Corinda and the other which bore no relation to either book, but allowed me to put into practice various things which I had learnt from Anneman.

Two shows, six effects, and only one of them not using anything from Corinda or Anneman.

So if you have really studied the two books (I am guilty of not having got Anneman until about three months ago!) then there should already be enough in there to not only get you started but also to keep you going for quite some time!

The problem with Jermays work (which I understand is excellent although personally have had no need to go through yet!) is that it is all effect based - there are very few outlined principles in his routines and certainly not such that you could study intently for a year and put into practice under a hundred-and-one guises.

Corinda, Anneman, and one of the psychological mentalism books (Tomo's Naked Mentalism or Psychological Subtleties) should keep you going for a long time - and the collective price of all of them is somewhere around the £70 mark these days.


If you have truly studied these two tomes then I have wasted my time in writing this reply - although I think you may perhaps be being a little hasty in a jump for Jermays work.
Corinda and Anneman is old stuff yes - but why do I still use their material (or at the very least their principles) in my act even now?
Because it's real world, hard hitting stuff.

Save yourself some money and buy a decent swami instead.

magic books by post.co.uk have 13 steps, as do most magic shops...amazon.co.uk should have the annemann and fulves ones cheapest...

you'll have to get used to a certain style of writing - but dont let that put you off ok? learn the techniques and some of the effects, then start watching richard osterlind dvds...

you'll have alot more fun with it all - and THEN try out the riskier psychologically based material...

and i've not even mentioned banachek or a few others either!

start saving!

I guess I'm in a similar position to Ian at the moment.

abraxus wrote:...13 steps by corinda, Practical Mental Magic by annemann, and Karl Fulves self-working mental magic...

I have two of those books in front of me right now.

The book test chapter in the Fulves book is rather good and there are quite a few other gems in there, too. Don't make the mistake of letting the "self-working" bit put you off. As for Annemann's book... (It's a treasure trove, it really is). I think it will take me a while to get through these books and familiarise myself with the basic techniques and principles of mentalism. I've also treated myself to Osterlind's Easy to Master set of DVDs, so looking forward to watching those.

No point trying to run when I can barely walk, eh?

annemann is the ultimate as far as im concerned...

replicant - if you havent already, go to lybrary.com you can buy all his little booklets as pdfs for a couple of quid each - ridiculous!

then there's dunninger, canasta, horwitz to look at too and marvel...

abraxus wrote:...replicant... go to lybrary.com you can buy all his little booklets as pdfs for a couple of quid each - ridiculous!...

I think I will do just that, but not until next month. I'm all magicked-up this month - went on a bit of a spending spree this afternoon. Amongst other things, I got myself the entire set of Osterlind Easy to Master DVDs for £65. Bargain or what?

I have spent 7 or 8 months on those books, I'll look into more. On the flip-side Not buying Jermay's stuff though is saving me a ton of money.