Top books to Help you progress
Looking to learn more than whats covered on this site? If so then you need to take a look at some of the books that are considered to be the best out there when it comes to sleight of hand no matter if its card tricks or coin tricks that are been done. The list bellow is not a top 4 list or anything of the sort. In fact the number one recommended series for card mastery is the Card College series by Roberto Giobbi
but just like the name suggests it has a small bit of a dryer approach than other books. That on top of the cost is a bit steep but if you can read it and afford it. It is definitely worth its weight in gold. Other than buying the hard copies of the books you also have the option to sign up for a free Amazon kindle app which will allow you to buy these books at a further reduced cost and carry them with you wherever you go. It always handy to have a book or two on hand for reference.
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Book 1 - The Royal road to card magic
This book was wrote by two noted authorities on magic and as a result has been in production for over a century. Although the patter is a bit out dated that doesn't take away from the fact that this is an amazing book and one that should be added to any serious magician looking to master card control. The book on a whole is very informative and the majority of the tricks do not require you to have a trick deck of cards which is a very good thing. The book is suitable for any level beginner to advanced and all the stages in between.
When going through the book you will notice that the authors go into as much detail as possible to explain how to control your cards. For example in part 1 of the book the over hand shuffle is explained and the authors talk about things like when to use the shuffle and how to control the top card, the second to top card and the bottom card. No matter where you look this book has amazing reviews and some even say that "this is card magic 101" or "THE definitive work on card magic".
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Book 2 - Expert card technique: close-up table magic
This book is suitable for beginners and advanced alike. Over the course of its 480 pages this book covers 341 sleights and tricks. It includes everything from false cuts to palming and even reverses all of which are detailed in 318 illustrations. Out of everything that the book covers you would think that there is not much detail in each section but each sleight gets its own chapter and this is accompanied with a chapter which goes through routines to preform.
The main reason this book is so popular is because it covers the foundation techniques which are required in a lot of different tricks. These techniques include jogging, deck ordering and stealing. No matter where you look when wanting the review of this book there is not a bad word to be said. It is one of the top essentials for card magicians.
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Book 3 - modern Coin magic
Just like it says on the the cover this book contains 116 sleights before you even take into account the number of tricks. Absolutely everything in this book is explained in great detail and has accompanying illustrations for all tricks and sleights. These illustrations are very easy to follow and makes the learning process that much easier. The best thing about this book is that there is only a hand full of tricks where you may need to have some prop other than a coin that you get from a spectator.
It goes without saying that this book is an absolute must for anyone that is looking to get into sleight of hand coin magic. No matter what kind of trick that you want to pull off with coins once you have this book its a pretty safe bet that you will be able to carry it out using some techniques covered by Bobo.
If your still not convinced why not have a look at some other reviews on Amazon
before you commit to buying.
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Book 4 - Now you see it, now you don't!: Lessons in sleight of hand
This one is aimed more towards the beginner side of sleight of hand. The book contains more that 1,500 drawings that show beginners each step of the trick and doesn't just cover sleight of hand for coin magic. It also covers everyday items from cigarettes to balls of foil or tissue.
As this book is mostly pictures it does not cover a lot about performance just how to do the tricks. However it is a good book to have in your arsenal from the very beginning especially if your not sure where you want to start because like mentioned above it does not just cover coin magic but a wide variety of other types of sleight of hand. There is mixed reviews for this book which is why it gets the number 4 slot but the good definitely out weight the bad and even the bad reviews are still pretty good. One review was that the book was kind of hard to follow but it was still a must if you wanted to build up a collection on sleight of hand.
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