talkmagic.co.uk

Economicon by Al Smith

Available from www.merlinswakefield.co.uk www.alakazam.co.uk or contact Merlins of Wakefield for ordering details merlins@btconnect.com

Price: £39.95

Catagory: Mentalism

Difficulty: 3 out of 5 You will need to learn the principles of the books workings and practise this along with presentation. That commitment will pay off.

They say:

A spectator is given a choice of two books which contain over one hundred and twenty five pages. Having selected one of the books, they are then instructed to turn to any page and memorize the first word on the top line. The mentalist can then reveal the thought of word without asking any questions whatsoever!

What’s more, the spectator is asked whether they wish to change books before selecting any page, any line, and any word. Even under these stringent conditions, the mentalist is able to reveal the thought of word leaving the audience gob smacked!

Everything is supplied. Two specially written examinable paper back books, with full colour covers, detailed instructions and performance suggestions. Simply the best book test around. At the price a miracle and a miracle at the price!

Book Dimensions: Approximately 5" x 8" (13cm x 20cm)


I say:
Ok…the description is accurate…in a way.

There are always things you need to bear in mind with advertising copy. Namely omitting aspects of an effect and veiled limitations. This product suffers from this irksome tendancy.

Having said that, it is a very good book test and seems to be to have been sold short by its own advertising copy.

The spectator being given a choice of book is true, there is no force.

Here is where the slippery nature of English and advertising copy sneaks in “…they are then instructed to turn to any page and memorize the first word on the top line.” and “…selecting any page, any line, and any word…” That’s not entirely accurate. Now I can’t mention method…obviously… but there is a degree of passive control used in these choices (no forcing) and a tiny bit of information needed from the spectator. Basically we all know it isn’t REAL mind reading, there has to be and is a real world method.

Now…

Saying all that, the methodology is pretty freakin’ clever! The working is solid and not hit or miss. The books are 100% examinable! Yes, that’s right…examinable! There is always a chance that a spectator, given a number of minutes to really scour the books could find…anomalies… shall we say, but such a forensic examination would make for a very dull routine now wouldn’t it. The spectator/s are free to flip through the books, read any lines on any pages, even compare the two books…they are indeed different from each other. Sweeeeet. This is far more than can be said for some book tests like “Double Vision”, although there are a number of very cool effects in that product that are darned clever.

You will need to commit some formulaic information to memory but it isn’t brain busting stuff and for one element of the two part effect, there is some very clever crib work to hand…sneaky ‘ol Al Smith!

There has been mention in other reviews of the workings being similar to MOABT but I have never had the pleasure of playing with MOABT, this information has not been contested so I assume it is relatively accurate.

One thing is for sure, Economicon is a fraction of the price of MOABT and packs some punch.

The books are, as I mentioned, examinable. If I were to be picky I would say that the covers on the books look a bit “textbook-ish” and not really in a modern novel style. The two books are exactly the same size, weight, thickness and construction…picky stuff I know, but I noticed it and you might too. I’m not going to worry about it though.

Overall:

I’m very impressed. This is a keenly considered product and well constructed. The methodology is very hidden and sure fire. The books are examinable in every way and both reveals are clean as a whistle. Finally all of this for £40 !! WOW! A bargain or what?! Show me another book test like it for the price. They ain’t out there.

Rating 8.5/10 Loses a tiny bit because of the cosmetic design style but that's not a critical issue.

.

Thank you !

Definately the BEST and most objective review of this book test!

Piers.

wow 8.5 out of 10,i will consider it in the near future,thanks for the review.

Got given this as a present. It is very good, always leaves them open mouthed. Taking Tom's comment about the little bit of info needed from the spectator, I have used 2 spectators + J.C's Thought Transmitter, got the required info with no questions and left them speechless!!

Wayne Dobson and Michael J Fitch demoed this at the Ipswich Magic Convention last month. It's still very effective and works extremely well!

by description, you could do this with teh w.o.w book test Meyer Yeddid put out .

( which i use, but failed miserably with on saturday, because i forgot to write the word down!)

I'm now picturing a small book rack holding these two books, the Meir Yeddid one, GoogleWhack Adventures, Cogito Ergo Sum and perhaps a few others, all ready and waiting to be selected and each offering the potential of different book test routines.....

Fantastic review. Seems like pretty good value, too, as book tests go.

Mandrake wrote:I'm now picturing a small book rack holding these two books, the Meir Yeddid one, GoogleWhack Adventures, Cogito Ergo Sum and perhaps a few others, all ready and waiting to be selected and each offering the potential of different book test routines.....

Chuck Hickok's idea of Books Galore is a good one. A rack of books offered to the audience and multiple revelations.

Dracula, Frankenstein, Sherlock Holmes, Shakespeare, Cogito (I would say that), Master Key, etc...

I also enjoy using the Marc Oberon method, which I road tested last weekend in Wales...very nice and totally impromptu...

oh don't go tempting me with yet another book test. The way I'm going at the moment, my stage routine is likely to turn into Becky's Book Test Show.

phronesis wrote:Chuck Hickok's idea of Books Galore is a good one. A rack of books offered to the audience and multiple revelations.

If you like that, please have a look at his recent work 'Thought-Full Telepathy', which expands upon that idea. Or, perhaps more precisely, contracts it.

Lady of Mystery wrote:oh don't go tempting me with yet another book test. The way I'm going at the moment, my stage routine is likely to turn into Becky's Book Test Show.

Oh go on, you know you'll buy this sooner or later - 'Now for my next trick, I just need to borrow a mobile library...' !

Economicon is very straightforward, the technique is easy, if you want to do a little memory work you can although it's not absolutely necessary. The fact that the spec is given a genuinely free choice of two books makes it all the more plausible although, as Tom mentioned, the style and design of the books is slightly different to the usual novels we see in the UK. In fact one of the books looked more like a text book on finance at first glance as there's a pile of Dollar bills on the cover! When Wayne Dobson and Michael Fitch did this at the Ipswich Day they did one version first then a different version, so it can be performed twice in succession - all explained in the instructions.

In the immortal words of the late Victor Kiam, 'I was so impressed I bought....' Economicon!

Lady of Mystery wrote:oh don't go tempting me with yet another book test. The way I'm going at the moment, my stage routine is likely to turn into Becky's Book Test Show.

That might not actually be a bad idea. Obvioulsy you wouldn't want to do a whole show of book tests but you could have several book cases on stage to make it look a bit like a library and then do several other book related tricks such as the haunted book or have predictions in envelopes stuck between the pages.

You could also have a couple of side tables scattered around with various props on them that wouldn't look out of place in a library for you to perform with. You could of course have a lamp on one with a pink fluffy lamp shade on it so as to remind everyone who you are.

But just imagine calling someone up on stage and giving them a whole shelf or even several shelves of books to choose from and then from this seemingly random choice you manage to divine the word they're looking at. If you have several books each set up to work in a different way, each performance for you would be slightly random and keep you on your toes as you'd never know which book test you were going to perform before they'd made their selection.

And if anyone there happened to be at another of your shows, the effect would most likely not be the same thus adding to their perception of your god-like abilities...

Part-Timer wrote:

phronesis wrote:Chuck Hickok's idea of Books Galore is a good one. A rack of books offered to the audience and multiple revelations.

If you like that, please have a look at his recent work 'Thought-Full Telepathy', which expands upon that idea. Or, perhaps more precisely, contracts it.

Thanks PT!