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I would like to get some advice about books to buy, not specifically learning materials but also books of interest. Sorry if this is the wrong place and very disjointed but I'll try my best to lay out what I'm looking for.

I would love to read a biography of Harry Houdini, there are countless to choose from and I wonder does anybody have an opinion of a good one to pick up?

I have an interest in Grifters and Con men and would love some suggestions for books on this subject, be it a history of the subject or somewhere to learn the methods. After reading the School for Scoundrels book on the 3 card monte the book "Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi" by George H. Devol is already on my reading list, but any other suggestions are greatly appreciated

Between my interesting in Houdini and Scam artists I've come across references to the Davenport brothers. I do not perform psychic or mentalist routines so I'm not really looking for learning materials here, just an interesting read on the subject of spiritualist and supernatural magic would be great.

Finally with me being a juggler I have an interest Human curiosities, Freak show/Sideshow tricks. I've read the Jim Rose autobiography already but would love suggestions on more reading material here about the classic sideshow. I learnt the human blockhead act a couple of years ago at the British Juggling Convention so learning a few more sideshow acts would be fun, but just reading about the history is a great interest.

As a last note I have a love for biography's in general so if you love a biography from the magic community please let me know.


I know this is abit of a wide scope and a big ask but thanks for sticking with me through my haphazard and longwinded post and thanks for any advice and info

mrz0mbie wrote:Grifters and Con men

Talk to Mark Lewis !

For the freak show side of things - look out for Ricky Jay's Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women - it's a great read!

For spiritualism, Miracle Factory's edition of David Abbott's Behind the Scenes with the Mediums is beautiful and Todd Karr got his hands on some awesome history (the friendship Abbott-- a debunker-- gained with a prominent psychic of his time is a neat read). The techniques he presents are psychologically devious and Teller's annotations to the MF edition are almost worth the price of the book.

Biographies:

I always mention this one: Chung Ling Soo's biography Glorious Deception is one of my all-time favorites. Jim Steinmeyer is brilliant.

David Bamberg's autobiography Illusion Show is also one of my favorites.

Germain the Wizard by Stuart Cramer presents a neat portrait of Germain's era of lyceum performances. Included are some damn good tricks that fooled the likes of Kellar.

If you can afford it (I personally saved up over a month of allowance money for it in high school), Taschen's mammoth book, "MAGIC", is awesome. I doubt you will ever own a magic book that is larger (it weighs roughly 17 pounds).

Hiding the elephant : Jim Steinmeyer great book, shows that nowadays we dont know how to really big a story up

JUAN TAMARIZ : verbal magic . Perhaps not so much a great magic book, although it does have a couple of nice tricks. But having performed a magic show on Radio 1 on Christmas day this year and an appearance on Radio 2 before christmas it did help me understand that its about scripting and explaining things without confusion.

Miracle Factory, have a CD book thing on Houdini - called Houdini Unbound.

Biographies - I've heard the Doug Henning one is good, Spellbound - I want to read that one.

For con artist books, I've heard good things about Simon Lovell's book, and Todd Robbins' book - I've seen him live and it was a hoot - very funny, witty, interesting and entertaining.

I got given 'Houdini' by Rapaport for Christmas and its a really beautiful book. Not sure what it costs but whatever it is....worth it.

For grifting/con-men, you could do a lot worse than The Big Con by David W. Maurer.

'The Secret Life of Houdini' is the best Houdini bio that I've read.

'How to Cheat at Everything' is a pretty fun con/gambling book.

R

The Davenport Brothers pop up in every book you read about psychics It is quite interesting to look at the history of the spiritualist church and how the Davenport brothers and Fox Sisters fit in with how the religion/church was foundered and is surprisingly still going. In some of the book they are both mentioned and seen as credible people and looked upto by the members of today.

Who knows there maybe they will start recognising Derren Brown as a modern version.