Magic & Conjuring: page 360

This is an incredible topological curiosity with a playing card and a third!

Four odd shaped pieces, cut from Bicycle playing cards, are tabled. You explain that three of the pieces marry together to form the shape of a complete playing card. The extra piece is only supplied in case of emergencies (i.e. if you lose a piece!) The extra 'emergency' piece is shown to be the same shape as one of the other pieces and is then set aside.

Strangely, although you easily solved the 'apparently' simple jig-saw puzzle, no one else can!

Comes with a bonus routine: Bomb$hell Deluxe.

1st edition...

Three playing cards (or business cards) are shown and then, with herculean strength, you tear out their centers - in order, you explain, to magically link them together.

Once they have been linked, they are then torn apart (to break the chain), then the "hoops" are restored and handed out for immediate examination.

You can make gimmicks in less than five seconds! Now also supplied with a 100% impromptu handling.

1st edition 2005; 4 pages.

You remove from your pocket four sections of a large, full-color, treasure map and jig-saw them together. There are 58 possible locations, and someone is asked to imagine that they have buried all their worldly goods at one of these locations.

You now start to deduce, letter-by-letter, the name of their thought of location. However, way before you have called out all the letters, you stop, pick up the four pieces, stick a label onto one of them and hand it to the spectator face down. He reveals where he mentally buried his things, and discovers that you stuck the label, with an X drawn on...

Four laminated cards are shown to each bear the image of a coin. (Included are images of cards bearing either 50p coins or Kennedy half-dollars).

They are tabled, one at each corner of your mat or, if strolling, one on each of four up-turned palms. The coins on three of the cards vanish and appear on the fourth card - in true matrix fashion. Then the four images are shaken off the card into reality. This leaves you with four double blanks and four real coins!

If you like, you can now perform your favorite coin-matrix with the 'real' coins using the blank cards as covers.

• easy to perform...

This is an absolutely incredible transposition of a 'winning' lottery ticket (you say that you had three of the numbers drawn), which is isolated in a wallet and a £10.00 note held in your hands!

Believe it or not it's an even faster transposition than the one you saw the Pendragons do on TV with their 'Metamorphosis' sub-trunk illusion. Best of all it's 100% self-working, but looks like incredible sleight-of-hand or real magic.

• automatically resets
• very topical as virtually everyone does the lotto (lottery)
• you can use any country's lotto ticket and currency
• comes with Flash Cash...

Someone shuffles an examined blue backed deck (which also contains four red backers). You take it back and, in seconds, produce the four aces. However, this production results in laughter from your audience, not stunned amazement.

You next explain that you are thinking of a word, and ask them to try and read your mind. They say that they think your word is SOAP. You act astonished and say that it was. You then remove the four red backed cards, seen earlier, and a letter has appeared on the back of each of them. The four letters are S, O, A and P!

The deck can now be examined. Hash-Town-Ding...

With a regular deck, in their own hands, two people each look at a card. They have a 100% free choice of any card. Their cards are lost - you genuinely don't know where they are in the deck!

You now put the cards into your empty pocket then, seconds later produce both selections. The rest of the deck is now removed and you are able to continue with any other card routines that you have mastered.

The instructions detail four presentations - the one above, one performed with a face up deck, one involving four people (ideal for two married couples - to see if they are compatible) and a 100%...

This is the strangest rising card method ever. Why? Because the card that rises is the actual gimmick. Also, the selected card rises and (to amusing patter) its back changes from red to blue. This means that you only have to pocket it, which is logical as its back no longer matches the rest of the cards, and the deck is clean.

• No weights, threads, elastics, springs, electronics, cut-out cards or anything like you've ever seen before!
• Add the gimmicked card to any red backed Bicycle deck!
• Bonus routine: Hallucination Plus
• Bonus routine: Impromptu, Borrowed Rising Cards

Any Card At Any Number - You table a cased deck, then remove a small, thin note-pad from your shirt pocket and ask one person to name any card. Let's assume he says, "The Queen of Spades." You record this on the pad. You next ask a second person to name any number from 1 to 52. Let's assume this person says, "22". You record this too, then pick up the cased deck. You remove the cards and show that they are all different. You hand the deck to one of them, and ask that he deals down to the 22nd card... it's the Queen of Spades!

If you would like to inject a little comedy, once the card and...

A collection of Stephen Tucker's 18 contributions to Al Smith's Abacus magazine.

1st edition 2007; 37 pages.

3. Play It Again Sam
6. Out Of His Dimension
8. Blackpool Blockbuster
10. Imogination
11. Spell My Number
14. Thotdek
15. Lady Luck
17. Done Up Like A Dog’s Dinner
19. Matterix
21. Polygraph Pasteboards
25. Pretty Polygraph
27. The Return
29. Shirning
31. Faro Hate
32. Staid Stacked
33. Utility Poker
34. Utility Poker Utilised
35. Two Keys To Baldpate

• 100% self-working
• instant reset
• everything can be examined at the end

You now turn to face them again and, after suitable concentration, reveal that they are holding the coin in their hand - they are! You then continue...

This is a really funny murder mystery routine. The zippered "case" (used to house everything) is "re-opened" and the possible weapons and five laminated clue-cards are removed. With your help, the spectator now deduces which of the weapons was used. Once he's done so, you explain, humorously, why the other weapons couldn't possibly have been used, so he's effectively solved the murder! This means that everything can be returned to the case, which can then be officially closed.

• No re-set is needed.
• Ideal for close-up or "murder weekend" shows.
• Not suitable for non-english speaking countries. ...

Three coins, one at a time, penetrate a purse and land in a glass tumbler. You will need a zippered cloth or leather coin purse and a magnet of the right strength.

• magnet reduces sleight of hand to a minimum
• resets automatically
• ideal for table hopping

Out of print since 1992, but now converted from printed form to e-book. Seventeen terrific routines - illustrated.

Within you will encounter thirteen of Stephen's very best card routines, three magic-square effects (with a difference) and one purely numeric item that is a step sideways from the original inspiration. That 'step sideways' is really the key here! Stephen has tried to look at things from a slightly different direction. One not normally explored. Sometimes with very interesting results!

3. Introduction
5. Out Of This Dimension
6. The Square Comes Full Circle
10. Doubly Impossible
12. Back...

Effect: Having just had a card freely forced, you table the deck. Your right hand hovers over it, then descends onto it. Suddenly... a card spins out of the deck and into your waiting left hand. On flipping it face up...it proves to be the very one selected! You are then carried through the streets on the shoulders of your enthusiastic audience.

Bonus: Cross: An ESP routine.

1st edition 2008; 4 pages.

INSTANT RE-SET! VERY EASY TO PERFORM!

Someone tries to find the queen amongst two jokers, but fails every time. You pocket the queen, and ask them to find the black and white joker... they fail again as... all three cards are queens!

Holding three face down jumbo(ish) sized playing cards you say, "These cards may look very large, but they aren't... it's just that I have very small hands." As you patter, you show the cards to be two jokers and... a queen.

You explain that they are to ignore the jokers and... try to follow the queen.

You now mix the three cards very quickly as you...

An incredible transposition of a fork and a spoon.

Showing a fork and a spoon you mix them, undercover of your hands, then ask someone to guess which is the fork. They guess and are either correct or wrong. You clearly place the spoon in your breast pocket, with the handle protruding. Suddenly, the fork in your hand becomes the spoon! The spoon in your breast pocket turns out to be... the fork!

No magnets or sleights! Can be performed without a table (ideal for strolling or at cluttered tables) and everything can be examined at the end. This was developed to link with Stephen's Mind-Power routine. ...

An unbelievable version of the legendary rising cards effect.

• no weights
• no threads
• no elastics
• no springs
• no magnets
• no wires

You can have one, two or even three cards selected then... have them rise out from different parts of the deck. Actually, you can rise more than three cards, but no more than fifty-two....

You show four face up cards, explaining that two are identical, and ask someone to call out the name of the card they see twice. They do this three times, but are only correct on their third attempt! You repeat the entire procedure with the backs of the cards (only two are the same colour) ... with the same result!

• cards can be examined at the end
• instant reset

Bonus: Chamile
With patter revolving about a strange dream, in which you were playing a game of Poker...your cards change faces and backs in a most...

Stephen Tucker was the publisher, editor, illustrator and creative genius behind Spell-Binder Magazine. It ran for three years and had 36 issues and 710 pages. (This does not include the three Special Issues.)

You will find some of the finest close-up magic effects: David Britland alone contributed 40 items, there were 6 new effects from Basil Horwitz, 4 from Jerry Sadowitz, 2 from Gazzo, 5 from Gordon Bruce, 3 from Roy Walton, 9 from Phil Goldstein, 12 from Reinhard Müller, 5 from Al Smith 2 from Bobby Bernard, 4 from Harvey Rosenthal, 7 from Ian Land, 12 from Paul Brignall, 7 from Peter Duffie, 6 from Roger Curzon, 6 from Shiv Duggal, 7 from Wayne Dobson and 109 from Stephen Tucker. Stephen has captured...

20 mentalism effects with a foreword by Max Maven. Out of print since 1985. Now again available as ebook.

From the foreword by Max Maven:

Stephen Tucker is probably one of the craziest people you will ever meet in magic. He may be crazy but he also happens to be highly talented and a very creative person. He has invented many magic effects and has supported himself over the years by performing magic, inventing magic tricks and editing and producing magic magazines. He was the editor and publisher of the amazing Spell-Binder Magazine.

Chicanery is a worthy successor to Spell-Binder and most of the effects within its pages are by Stephen. He gave himself pen names and a typical Tucker touch is that the names are Pen Tell, Mark Erpen, Nick Fountain,...

Stephen Tucker is the magician who prefers a clever gimmick over a difficult sleight. That is not to say that he isn't capable to execute some of the most difficult sleights - and you will get a taste of those in this ebook, too. But the real strength here are Stephen's clever gimmicks and uses for common items and the fun and amazing routines he constructs with them.

• 13 card miracles
• 9 bonus effects (originally published in the Talon)
• 27 futuristic coin routines

1st edition 1983, original 73 pages, PDF 109 pages.

Table of Contents

3. Contents
5. Introduction

   PARAGON - card effects...

"I really enjoyed all of these routines! Very nice. The White House is especially cool!" - Cameron Francis.

"You have some very nice thinking in these variations." - Peter Duffie.

As one of Martin Breese's customers I recently received a newsletter from him that drew my attention to a routine of Peter Duffie's called IDEAL HOLMES. It's a really great self-working routine, and this is what happens...

A regular deck of cards is shuffled and then cut by someone a couple of times. You take back the cards and spread them between your hands and have one FREELY selected by someone. He places the card directly...