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Carter Beats the Devil.
A novel by Glen David Gold


The review.

Ok, first off let me apologise – this isn’t the review of a Magic trick – nor is it a review of a magic book, DVD or Video. This is a just review of a novel, but IMHO it is interesting and relevant enough to be mentioned here.

The main character in this novel is Charles Carter, better known as “Carter the Great”, For those that didn’t know already, “Carter the Great” was a magician in the golden era of Magic. He was born 1876 and died 1936.

This is not a biography, so I am not sure how much in the story is actually factual, but it details Charles Carter’s life from childhood and how he got started in magic, to his first magic shows and then right through to his extravaganzic headlining days. I found it an absolutely fascinating read both from the point of view of the life of a magician of old, and the fact that I thought it was also and a damn good story to boot.

Reading this book has made me want to learn more about Charles Carter and other magicians of the era that were mentioned in the story, such as Houdini and Thurston. This was a time of magic before Television and initially before movies.

http://archive.salon.com/audio/fiction/ ... eats/index

links to audio extracts.

the poster looks very familiar, anyone else recognise it?

Bug.

As far as I was aware, the book cover was taken from one of the original "Carter The Great" posters. Of course I was just assuming this.

Was I wrong then?

Hi there,

Just wanted to say that I've finished reading this excellent book and highly recommend it! I couldn’t put it down towards the end.

I have a couple of questions though, so if someone who has read it could PM me, I'd be much appreciated.

Thanks!

I read this too; it is a fantastic book and it really renewed my interest in magic. It has a really good plot as well as featuring some excellent magic. Since i read about a year ago, I have been really focussing on my magic. I guess it reminded me how much I like magic.

Another great book to read is Hiding the Elephant: How Magicians Invented the Impossible ~Jim Steinmeyer. This is a historical book that shows you where it all came from. You encounter some of the greats of the past 150 years or so and gain a good understanding of the history of some greatest effects in magic.

Gah...you got there before me!

I was about to say that I got Hiding the Elephant last week, and it really is brilliant. It's a history of the era of stage magic, with vanishing cabinets, Pepper's Ghost, and of course the Houdini elephant vanish!

It is a great history of Maskelyne and Houdini and the like, and I do recommend it if you are at all interested in the era.

Kati

I found Carter Beats The Devil very intereresting but overlong. The author does jump( irritatingly) back & forth, as in the Da Vinci Code.
And yes the cover is from an original Carter poster.My favourite magic novel is a bit of a fairytale, The Man Who Wss Magic( pub 1966) by Paul Gallico, (author iof the Poseidon Adventure, The Small Miracle, The Snow Goose , the Mrs. Harris series & many more) Read the magic Competition chapter and see how many magicians You know can be linked with the performers.Gallico had quite an insight into the less likeable traits of magicians. See if you can find the 6 murder mysteries by Clayton Rawson. These include Death In A Top Hat, Death Out Of Thin Air, Footprints On The Ceiling and feature The Great Merlini. Then there's some of val Andrews Sgerlock Holmes series (mostly published by Martin Breese) SH & The Egyptian Hall Adventure, SH & The Theatre Of Death (The Great Lafayette) SH & The Houdini Birthright. In the latter, Houdini's coffin is opened and there is NO body inside. Strangely shortly after the book was published a scientist x rayed the coffin in the USa AND DECLARED THERE WAS NO BODY INSIDE. Wow
Allen Tipton