Guest Article by Bradley Barefoot
When Jay published his “My Five Favorite Mentalism Books” article and shared it with me, I had a wonderful time revisiting some of the books on his list because they are ones I also enjoy. Then Jay asked me to share my five favorite books. Well, he didn’t technically ask directly. It was more the way that because he is a friend, you know he wants you to do it but doesn’t want to make you feel forced. It is like when a friend says, “Hey, I am moving this Saturday. There will be lots of beer and pizza if you want to come over and hang out.”
You may at first think that is a weird passive way to ask, but remember, my friend, Jay, is a Mentalist. Mentalists communicate with their audiences this way to take advantage of some Psychological Subtleties and often practice on their friends. I know about Psychology For the Mentalist, so I understand the task assigned. Now, the challenge is narrowing my collection to just the five books that help me deliver the Art of Mentalism full of Strong Magic. What Books of Wonder shall I choose?
Asking me to choose my five favorites overall is a herculean task. In my magic career, I have focused on geek magic at the college level, the generic party magician, full-on mind reader, and currently working acts with a séance show or as an Appalachian Folk Magician. If I choose my five favorite books, should they include each of my iterations? Or, right now, I am researching the Q and A act. Do the books I just started digging into get a spot? What should I do? Well, I am a magician. I cheat by trade, and so I will cheat here, too.
My five favorite magic books for beginners:
Mark Wilson’s Complete Course In Magic
This is my number one recommendation to anyone who is just getting started. Beginners want to get right into the magic, and this book has a little bit of everything. This book allowed me to dive in and start performing some basic tricks. While I was performing the basic effects, I was able to focus and practice some of the more difficult effects and work on them. This book created one of my very first shows. 60% of the material from my first paid gig came right from this book. And to this day when I perform and teach cups and balls to students, it is Mark Wilson’s routine in this book that I use.Magic: The Complete Course by Joshua Jay
This book is not on my bookshelf. That is a weird way to talk about a favorite book, right? I know. The book is not on my shelf because I gave it away. Twice. This book came out in 2008. I was well into my mentalist phase, but it was on the shelf at the big book store so naturally I had to have it. I did not read it cover to cover, but I loved the ease of reading it. I liked how accessible it made magic, so when I was asked “How do I get started in magic?” I responded naturally with, “By asking me, here take this and let me know if you have any questions.” I then gave this book to that person. When another copy came into my possession, I again gave it away. I am somewhat of a book hoarder, so the fact that I so freely give this one away, not loan, give, I think is a testament to how much I enjoy it.This book has an advantage over Mark Wilson’s book. It came with a DVD when it first came out. I don’t know if it still comes with a DVD, but a quick Google search says that it does. My hope is they update the book with the times and move the DVD to a digital option so more people will be able to watch it. Regardless, Joshua has a calming and relaxed way of teaching that I find almost hypnotic at times. The directions are mostly clear and easy to follow. Only a few times does the camera not quite show what you need, but the book helps alleviate that.
Modern Coin Magic by J. B. Bobo
I loved this book when I first got it. I have a different respect for it now. This book helped me answer a valuable question early in my study of magic, “Are you a coin worker?” The Mark Wilson book taught me some coin magic, so I thought maybe I was a coin worker and picked this book up to find out. Somewhere around chapter 9, Coin Classics, and chapter 10, Coin Boxes I knew the answer to my question. I am not a coin worker. The sleights and moves that I learned along the way, I still use in other ways, though. So even though coin working was never the direction I went, this was still very influential in my work.
The Little Giant Encyclopedia of Card & Magic Tricks by The Diagram Group
The card magic section of Mark Wilson’s book got me started. Why not? Cards are what most people think of when they hear magician. This book contains all the card sleights that I still use to this day. It also had plenty of mentalism/mind reading, illusion, transposition, vanishing, and appearing effects. The card section in this book was one of my first forays into mentalism.
I know much to the dismay of a lot of mentalists, I am saying there is mentalism in cards. However, I would say that most card magic is mentalism. I mean, most card tricks boil down to picking a card, hiding the card, and here’s your card. If find it blindfolded, that’s reading with your fingers, if you find it while touching the card, that is contact mind reading, you just reveal the card without “finding it”, that is mind reading. That is all mentalism. If you have them think of the deck of cards, add your birth year to the value and subtract the current phase of the moon on a chart in your pocket, then subtract their current age, and divide by two to tell you their final number, that’s prop-less, but technically mentalism. You find the right hook to hang your hat on with this premise, and you will never go broke performing.
This book still sits on my shelf in a place of esteem and high regard.The Amateur Magician’s Handbook by Henry Hay
This is my favorite beginner book on how to perform. I say beginner because this book has kneecapped itself with the title. It does not matter where you are in your career, I think you should read this book. For the beginner, though, it has full shows and how to structure a show. This book has some great effects, a few used in my shows. I still go back and reference this book when putting together a new show or fitting a piece into an existing show.
Well, there it is. 5 books for beginning in magic. So, about that cheating? Well, my five favorite books in magic history are…
The Illustrated History of Magic by Milbourne Christopher
This book is a wonderful dive into the history of magic, and some famous performers along the way, and is a great groundwork for understanding the history of magic. The pictures and detail in this book are wonderful and after reading it, I started to see where I fit in with magic as a whole and not just as a guy doing card tricks.
This is based on the tale the Professor would often share about his hunt for the middle deal and the cardsharp that mastered it. I suspect there was a level of creativity applied to this tale, but at the end of the day, it is a great story about dedication to magic.
Hands down, this is my favorite book on magic history. Possibly just my favorite book. It goes into even more detail about the sacrifices the golden age magicians would make in dedication to the art of magic. It by no means shows William Robinson as a hero or even a great guy. He put his magic up front no matter what the cost.
This was the second book relating to magic history that I ever read, and it was a journey. It went on a deep dive into the history of magic and traced the origins of what led to Houdini vanishing an elephant. I got so into this book that for a brief period I forgot what it was building to. It was quite a journey. I could not put it down and enjoyed the entire journey.
The Complete Jarrett by Guy E. Jarrett and Jim Steinmeyer
Guy Jarrett had opinions and I am here for them. Guy Jarrett was an illusion builder for Broadway as well as magicians like T. Nelson Downs and Howard Thurston. Jarrett also thought that all magic should not only strive for perfection, but any effort short of perfection was garbage. This meant he would regularly trash the stars of his day for dumping their garbage on the audiences. Jarrett had some great ideas and did some great work, but his name seems to be left off of a lot of lists of magicians because he was a thorn in the side of his contemporaries. For me, it was refreshing to see his view and take on the celebrity magicians of his day. I do not want to spoil too much, but it is very interesting and a great way to level-set some of the performers we elevate in the art and remind us they are people.
Of course, then there are my five favorite magic books that have helped my professional career
Anything on the theory of magic written by Eugene Burger (Cheating again)
I enjoy reading everything by Eugene Burger that I can get my hands on, currently, that means Spirit Theater, Intimate Power, Strange Ceremonies, The Experience of Magic, The Performance of Close-Up Magic, and Eugene Burger: From Beyond. I don’t read everything by him because I think he was a god among men or that everything he wrote was sacrosanct. I read everything he wrote because his writing style makes me feel like I am having a conversation with him. This conversation means I can take his advice where applicable, but I can also disagree with him when I think the advice does not fit me. For example, I disagree with Burger on many of the finer details described in Teaching magic, but overall it was worth the read if for no other reason than to make me think about teaching and learning magic and develop a process that works for me and for anyone I am working with.
Tarbell Course in Magic Vol. 1 through 8 by Harlan Tarbell
It was an investment, I’ll admit. I will say, instead of buying it piecemeal, at 25 to 35 bucks a book, it is much better to just save the money, and buy the whole set at once. The index in Volume 7 has made my life so much simpler. I recently, while looking for ideas with blindfolds, found that there are just a few volumes I use regularly, usually what I need I find in Volume 4, 6, or 8. However, the information in the other volumes makes for a wonderful security blanket. You will probably notice that, as far as a professional career in magic, I do not list a ton of books on effects. This is because, at this stage, I am taking what I have and refining it into a top-notch and unique presentation. If, however, I decide to write a show that I need a different effect to highlight my point, Tarbell is my starting point.
The Ultimate Marketing Toolkit by Paula Peters
This is just a run-of-the-mill marketing book. It is not specific to any business and is a guide to working on your marketing campaigns. The second edition I work from has social media listed as an online social network to give you an idea of the age. It is my favorite because it is a marketing book I can work from. To use my space here to soapbox a bit, anybody looking to go pro or semi-pro should get a marketing book, not necessarily magic-themed. Just a marketing book you can work with and follow. Consistency is the name of the game, so work from the book, give a solid effort, and then tweak slightly until you are happy with the results. The biggest issue magicians have in marketing is a lack of consistency. It can take time for a campaign to build, and if you start off changing everything every couple of days or weeks, you will never know what worked and what didn’t. Pick a strategy and work it for at least 6 months with just minor tweaks after two to three months.
Building a Character by Constantin Stanislavski
This book is a great book that sits on my bookshelf right next to an Actor Prepares. I have An Actor Prepares because Rick Maue recommended at a character development workshop that everyone get a copy of the book, he doesn’t care if you read it, but just put it on the shelf where you see it regularly. The idea is to remind you that an actor prepares. I sort of treat Building a Character the same way. I have spent an exhaustive amount of time, effort, energy, and resources building and preparing my character. The advice of just being yourself on stage but cranked up to 11 never sat well with me. It created a constant existential question of ‘“who am I?” I believe this is the cause of so many carbon copy magicians. It’s easy to give constantly repeated advice no matter how bad it is and give no explanation or depth to the advice, and this book reminds me of Rick’s workshop and helps me stop the trend of bad advice.
The Success Book by Magic Inc.
I have volumes 1 and 2, and if I could bother to spend the 2 minutes to quickly search I could tell you how many there are in the series, but if you are interested, I have faith you will figure it out. It is a series of spiral-bound books that just lists business ideas for a performer. It has places worth considering for performing. One of the ideas that I fell in love with was to convert a bus into a mobile magic show you can set up at various events and charge admission or book it for parties. I love this idea and for 4 years have been waiting for the right time to do something similar with my spin on it. Regardless, if you are a performer struggling to find a place to work, these books are filled with ways to capitalize on your performance.
So, that is a small selection of some of my favorite books. Feel free to reread and see if you can spot my favorite Mentalism book titles in this article as well. Maybe someday I will break down a few other categories if you wish to read more. Let me know your thoughts, you can reach me @barefootmindreader or @appalachainfolkmagician on social media.
