Reviews: Read What Tim Conger Is Saying

Hofzinser's Card Conjuring

reviewed by Tim Conger (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Tuesday 29 June, 2010)

This book is legendary for reasons I think are well-deserved, if only because Harry Houdini once had a copy of this book and then sold it and was sorry that he couldn't replace it. He was a very big fan, as evidenced in the biography in Houdini On Magic.

Hofzinser's use of stacked, perarranged, and special decks doesn't suit me right now, but who knows what the future may bring? In any case, maybe I can master one of the sleights Hofzinser invented and use it in a trick of my own invention. Reading Hofzinser really expands my magical imagination. Plus, his patter is hilarious--sort of a cross between a 19th Century psychologist and a pirate. One of his mock decks, for example, he calls "the divine." At another point, he says his deck only has four Aces so he will have to "employ his satanic powers to cause these to multiply. Now try getting away with saying that nowadays! Anyway, the important word of warning is the sleights are really really hard even for unusually dextrous people so you have to really be determined if you want to learn to do a Hofzinser trick. Treat it as an adventure and a keepsakes.