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Liam, Derren's website is the only place you can buy Devil's Picture Book, you have to answer a couple of questions to get access to the Magicians only area and you can order it from there.

Thanks for your help, Heckler.

I'm just about to order a copy.

I have both books which I bought when they were about £30 or less each. Good as they are, they aren't worth £150 each and you'd do far better to invest in the other works mentioned. Google around for stuff by Theo Annemann, certainly Corinda's 13 Steps to Mentalism if that's your thing, Bobo's for coins and Mark Wilson for a very wide scope of general magic. Karl Fulves' books are pure gold and I reckon you could buy just about all of these for less than £300.

Good advice from Mandrake. Unless you are a book collector, and are looking for a profit in the years to come, why not try lybrary.com and look up Allan Ackerman?

Mandrake wrote:I have both books which I bought when they were about £30 or less each. Good as they are, they aren't worth £150 each and you'd do far better to invest in the other works mentioned. Google around for stuff by Theo Annemann, certainly Corinda's 13 Steps to Mentalism if that's your thing, Bobo's for coins and Mark Wilson for a very wide scope of general magic. Karl Fulves' books are pure gold and I reckon you could buy just about all of these for less than £300.

Hi Mandrake,

I've got Corinda's 13 steps, Annemann's practical mental magic & Bobo's modern coin magic, and while I've only skimmed through them so far (as I'm concentrating on cards at the minute), they do look to be very good. I'm very impressed with 13 steps, there's some nice clean card effects in there. As for Karl Fulves, while I don't own anything buy him, I've got the card college light trilogy, and a number of his tricks ( with revised or slightly different handling by Giobbi) appear in there and they are really good.

I'm not a Derren Brown collector, and I'm not a book snob either, not one of these people that will only take unclipped 1st editions. I just like really like Derren's style and the way he handles the audience when he's performing. It'd just be nice to own a book or two by Derren, on how the magic works, tricks & theory, etc.....as opposed to stuff like tricks of the mind or confessions of a conjurer. While I don't doubt that they are good books, they're just not quite what I'm after. I went to to see him in Enigma live at the de montfort hall last year,and he was brilliant. His spririt cabinet routine is extremely impressive.

I'm getting Derren's devil's picture book DVD instead, I don't think I'll bother with the books, although it would have been nice.

Mandrake, what about Lewis gansons books on Dai vernon.....any good? Worth 30 pounds or so for a copy?

Regards,

Liam

Certainly Devil's Picture Book will give you far more info on how to perform some extrenmely clever routines, bear in mind that this is all stuff which Derren no longer does, he's moved on from that style in the past few years. I suspect he would still do most of them at the drop of a hat under the right circumstances and they give a great insight into the way he works and structures effects.

Your library so far sounds like a very well balanced selection of magic in various forms, sadly I've not read any of the Lewis Ganson books you mention and I'm trying to not buy many more books mainly because I have several hundred already, most are up in the cobwebby loft at Madrake Mansions and there isn't much room for anything else !

Liam wrote:Hi Guys,

I'm a big Derren Brown fan and I've found some copies of Derren Brown's Absolute Magic and Pure Effect floating around online and I have decided that I'm going to get one of them, but I can't really afford both, nor can I warrant paying 300 plus pounds for 2 books, so which one of these do you think is better?

The type of magic I do is mainly cards & close up, but I'm trying to incorporate bits of psychological and mentalism acts in as well.

I guess what I'm asking is.....which one would benefit a card magician more?


Regards,

Liam

Neither.

If someone else had written these books they wouldn't command such high prices. I have Pure Effect and it's average, there are far better books for a fraction of the cost.
If its card magic you are interested in I thoroughly recommend The Card Magic of Nick Trost.
Full of stuff you will actually use and none of it knuckle busting. You'll thank me one day. There's some incredible packet tricks in there, real audience pleasers.

Lord Freddie,
You are so right. I've just had a chance to read 'The Card Magiic of Nick Trost' and all I can say is "What have I been doing since 1997?!"
'

I would suggest Absolute Magic. DB's lecture DVD and Devil's Picturebook cover more or less what is in Pure Effect, but the theory he put into Absolute Magic is not in any of his other works.

Acolophon wrote:Lord Freddie,
You are so right. I've just had a chance to read 'The Card Magiic of Nick Trost' and all I can say is "What have I been doing since 1997?!"
'

It great isn't it? I love Trik Cards and use different coloured backs rather than the 'x's.
It's one I perform a lot as I do his take on Out of this World. Far more commercial, usable stuff than in Pure Effect and a fraction of the cost.

It depends very much on what your personal preferences and tastes are. You can never know what you are going to get from a book. However...

Absolute Magic---

... is more concerning the 'resonance' of magic and how to make it meaningfull, artistic and theatrical for the spectator. It doesn't have any effects in per se, except from descriptions of some Pick-Pocketing routines, which I am sure Derren Brown has now come to his senses about. Typically from DB it is anecdotal, verbose and humorous, however, I feel the content is a little over-rated. Essentially, the imperative is: 'take thine magic seriously, treat it like an art and don't be an awful second rate magician, for God's sake!'. In that respect, you could save a lot of money by perhaps reading Peter Brook, Brecht, Artaud, Stanislavski, thinking for yourself and generally accepting it as a truism that most magicians are awful and embaressing.

Pure Effect--

... again has a certain unwarranted mythology about it. It's theoretical comments are actually superb (minus the NLP nonsense, about which it can only be hoped Derren has once again come to his senses about), in particular the notion of 'invisible compromise', which is the ideal I strongly feel in many ways made Derren Brown the mentalist he is and is truly a principle worth aspiring after. Most of the book comprises some brilliantly thought out routines, but which beyond a few sleights and innovations, are more a record of his then repertoire which, one should hope, would be utterly useless for any serious magician concerned with their own routines, beside giving a few ideas. A far better book regarding card sleights-- and one which had a heavy influence on DB himself-- would be Guy Hollingworth's 'Drawing Room Deceptions', which if memory serves, Derren is also indebted to for his heavy use of lateral palming and various other sleights.

To sum up: Certainly I would say for what they are worth, they are certainly not worth what they are worth.


To clarify, they are brilliant, I am not denying that for a second- but there are very many brilliant books about magic theory, superb books on card sleights brimming with superb routines to inspire and sleights to use and there is a lot to look into if one is serious about 'Magical Artistry' on the front of performance arts. If the books were £30-40 they would definatley be worth it, but ultimatley they are simply a taste of Derren's style and performance philosophy and the last thing he needs is any more imitation, when there is plenty of material in the ether on those topics which will be of equal and perhaps greater value to provoking those who truly care about creating resonant, artistic, strong routines and magic performances.

On this basis, I would strongly recommend that you buy NEITHER because the ugly truth is that they are not worth the amount of money they cost. If you really want some solid and brilliant routines specifically to see Derren's undoubtedly brilliant style, I would say that Derren's 'The Devil's Picturebook' is a much better investment. It is superb material, a lot of which comes from his books, and is of interest to any serious magician, but being more affordable it is a more sensible use of money. Alternativley, if you just want some brilliant card magic or performance philosophy there are many, many under-read classics to be obtained and to study.

Mumbungo wrote:In that respect, you could save a lot of money by perhaps reading Peter Brook, Brecht, Artaud, Stanislavski, thinking for yourself and generally accepting it as a truism that most magicians are awful and embarassing.

If magicians spent more time studying acting and performance rather than learning one hundred different ways of controlling a card to the top of the pack, maybe the general public would have more respect for it as an art form rather than just jumping to the assumption that all magicians are the horrific creepy Uncle Bob monstrosities that they remember from their childhoods and are commonly seen propping up the bar at magic conventions wearing sequinned waistcoats and playing card ties. When I think about how I want to appear as a magician and, more importantly, what I would like to see when I watch a magician, I think of the characters in The Illusionist or The Prestige- you know, magicians who in actual fact are portrayed by professional actors and therefore are actually convincing as people who appear to magical abilities rather than coming across as socially backward degenerates who spend to much time perfecting their classic pass.

Only other magicians care if you've perfected a complicated sleight, if you're doing it properly, the audience won't ever notice you've done it so why not use an easier alternative, think about how their going to perceive what you're doing, and spend more than a microsecond thinking about whether or not at the end they're clapping because they're astonished or if they're just being polite because "you've obviously spent a lot of time practising you're complicated moves and it would be massively rude to reward your efforts by being honest and yawning in your face."

Maybe this isn't the right thread to have a rant but I've seen a lot of magicians and been massively disappointed by how boring and unconvincing they are but I've rarely been to the theatre and gone away with the same feeling so we must be doing something wrong. Don't get me wrong, I love good magic of all varieties, it just appears to me that it's pretty thin on the ground and the muggles all know it!

If its card magic you are interested in I thoroughly recommend The Card Magic of Nick Trost.
Full of stuff you will actually use and none of it knuckle busting. You'll thank me one day. There's some incredible packet tricks in there, real audience pleasers.

That's another that sounds really good, just ordered.

Karma wrote:

If its card magic you are interested in I thoroughly recommend The Card Magic of Nick Trost.
Full of stuff you will actually use and none of it knuckle busting. You'll thank me one day. There's some incredible packet tricks in there, real audience pleasers.

That's another that sounds really good, just ordered.

It's great, plenty you can use. I also recommend David Acer's books particularly Random Acts of Magic and his new one More Power To You which contain lots of commercial effects, cards and otherwise. These books are a fraction of the cost of Derren's books and much more useful in terms of material you will find useful.