Cards in Magic & Conjuring: page 66

J. Stewart Smith presents more of his mystifying card effects, accomplished without knuckle-busting sleight of hand. The author was something of an enigma, eschewing public performances in favor of fooling magicians and mentalists at magic conventions. After a process of continual refinements from demonstrating his effects under the critical eyes of magicians, he would assemble a small number of his latest creations and issue them in small, limited-edition booklets. To say that his books are hard to come by is a gross understatement. This is a shame since the magic is priceless.

Smith was...

From the foreword by Ken de Courcy:

1st edition ~1947, PDF 6 pages.

Out of Control is a surprising, impossible location effect. The magician never touches the deck or even looks at it because the spectator will do everything under the table including two riffle shuffles and several cuts. Yet despite these stringent premises, the magician will be able to find the spectator's card face down in the spread of the deck. Great reactions especially from fellow magicians.

1st edition 2022, video 13:51

Available again after a long absence is this fine work by J. Stewart Smith, presenting eleven more of his mystifying card effects, each of which is accomplished without knuckle-busting sleight of hand. This is the book that had card workers talking all over the country. It had to be good to receive praise from such internationally known close-up workers. See below for a few brief quotes from some of the very best.

PARTIAL CONTENTS:

• Ascending Treys
• Pop Over Treys
• The Four Aces
• The Four Queens
• Follow The Leader
• Sevens and Jacks
• The Inseparable Sevens
• Peek-A-Boo Discovery
• Horse...

This effect is undoubtedly a fooler. The magician will be able to cut to three cards that reveal the exact position of the spectator's card. Conditions are really impossible. A true miracle with a normal deck. Always great reactions from both magicians and laypeople. Always a different number.

After the magician gives the deck a shuffle, the spectator is asked to cut the deck about in half and to take from the lower portion some cards, shuffle them, remember the top card, and put them back on top of the lower portion of the deck. Then the spectator shuffles the top portion of the deck and...

J. Stewart Smith's third book on card magic, containing six more card masterpieces. Like his previous releases, all the work is accomplished without knuckle-busting sleight of hand. Only a few simple moves are necessary, easily within the grasp of the average magician.

PARTIAL CONTENTS:

• Our Cards
• False Cut
• Ascent of the Black Fours
• A Restoration
• Triple Alliance
• The Four Aces
• Double Cut
• A Prediction

Card workers the world over praise his beautiful effects and their methods. See below for a few brief quotes from experts in the field.

"The author has attempted to approach as...

This can be done with a borrowed shuffled deck that does not have to be complete. (The only requirement is that the deck is in decent condition, but it does not have to be a new deck.) There is no stack or prior arrangement necessary. Somebody hands you a deck and you go right into the routine. You ask the spectator to take about a third from the deck, shuffle it at heart's content, then remember the bottom card and burry that pack somewhere in the middle of the remaining portion on the table. This all happens while you look away. You then take the deck behind your back and find the spectator...

J. Stewart Smith continues with his professionally-praised run of card magic routines, this one containing seven appealing card mysteries. Like his previous releases, all the work is accomplished without knuckle-busting sleight of hand. Only a few simple moves are necessary, easily within the grasp of the average magician. Smith strives to strip down his creations so every move is logical, from an audience's perspective. There is no confusion as to what happens. It looks like pure magic.

PARTIAL CONTENTS:

• A Transformation
• The Nostalgic Trio
• The Unseen Passage
• Two Faces Up
• Pure and...

An incredible coincidence plus an incredible prediction that looks completely impossible. You present two decks to a spectator. They have a free choice (no force). The spectator takes one deck, and you take the other. Both of you shuffle your deck. Then the decks are exchanged. Each one gives their deck a final cut. Then each one puts their deck into their pocket. Then cards are withdrawn from the top of the deck and put face up on the table until a match of the face appears. Once a match appears the magician presents a prediction that was on the table the whole time in which he predicted...

Best of the Best is an effect that makes most of the potential of the pre-ordered deck. But don't worry because to perform it you will not need memory work and no complicated mathematical operations. Everything is super impossible but really simple to do. Three divinations plus a prediction, a surprising climax. The method behind this effect is truly amazing and fascinating.

• A normal deck
• No memory work
• No complicated mathematical operations
• No gimmick

1st edition 2022, video 17:34.

All patter and two excellent videos are included.

My favorite effect of all time is my version of Dream Card, which was in my most popular e-book, My Favorites, and I have received accolades from professional magicians around the world for this effect. My second favorite is Dream Card Light which I have been very apprehensive about sharing because it is such a powerful effect - and it's easier to do than Dream Card ... and I've loved this trick for years.

This is more than just an impossible effect ... it is theater. The patter is so very powerful, that it is exactly what will be remembered most - and...

You can do this with a borrowed shuffled deck and four jokers you prepared beforehand. The spectator shuffles the deck. The performer cuts it into six packets. The spectator chooses four of these packets by placing the four face-up jokers on any of the four packets. These packets are cut by the spectator. The four cards lying next to the jokers are pulled out of the packs. Their value is added and that many cards are counted down in the remainder of the deck. The card selected this way is predicted on the backs of the four jokers.

1st edition 2022, video 17:15.

Totally Impossible is a really strong effect with a very intriguing and fascinating method. The magician is able to cut with a knife to the card selected by a spectator. Simply and totally unbelievable. Obviously a magician fooler, as in the style of Joseph B. One of the most impossible divinations, one of the most dramatic localizations to add to your repertoire. You can do this with a borrowed shuffled deck. The Deck does not have to be complete.

• No gimmick
• No peek
• No one-way
• No short cards or gaffed cards
• No sticky stuff
• No force

An infallible multiple predictions-effect with an incredible climax. Everything is done with a normal deck of cards.

1st edition 2022, video 14:20.

This is a new self-working card trick: the viewer will choose two cards, to represent the law and by means of which he will get two more cards, lost in the deck, which he will then divide into four bundles. Over the course of two separate stages, the spectator himself will insert the "sheriffs" within the deck, as arbitrarily as possible. The decks will be shuffled, cut and completed but, despite a thousand adversities, the two "sheriff" cards will succeed in tracking down and capturing the two "outlaws," generated by the combination of the first two cards, chosen at random.

The legend...

Dai Vernon's Twisting The Aces, has for decades been regarded as an all-time classic and thankfully, the new wave of 21st Century card experts still carry the torch for this perennial favourite. Over the years, new additions and presentations are published, adding even further interest to this wonderful effect.

Australian card man Ian Baxter admits to having performed TTA for sixty years, starting just three years following its publication in 1960. Up until recently, he performed it totally 'as is' from Dai Vernon's More Inner Secrets Of Card Magic.

"Tampering with a Vernon treasure such as TTA, can often promote controversy" admits Baxter....

This is Ken's take on R.M. Jamison's 'Yogi Tells' effect from The Phoenix. Someone thinks of one of four cards of the same value of different suits. After two brief shuffles, you spell "Y-O-G-I" three times discarding the card on the last letter, and the card that remains is the one the spectator chose. In Ken's version the spectator thought of card magically flys into the pocket of the performer.

1st edition 1984, 8 pages; PDF 9 pages.

Excerpt from the Introduction:

A subtle system for card workers. Four card miracles.

Excerpt from the introduction:

A timely favorite for any magician with a deck of cards in hand is Think-Stop. With a popularity spanning decades, this absolute classic has attracted attention from virtually every known card expert of the 20th and 21st centuries. Practical additions and/or worthwhile improvements to this gem are rare indeed. However, this brand-new handling from Australian card man Ian Baxter easily meets that challenge.

Reviewer David Jones comments:

"The Stop Trick is a stunning card effect which has traditionally depended on the use of a psychological force and hence cannot be relied upon to work...

A series of novel and above all entertaining card tricks, all requiring a minimum of skill, the simplest of apparatus and all designed for the maximum entertainment and audience appeal.

No. 1. "A Double-Dose": Predestined and Black and Red Computation II.

Two effects, both using the same subtle principle, credited to Nick Trost.

PREDESTINED is for platform performances. You can use a Jumbo pack of cards and four cardboard plates. You will make this up in a few minutes and have a good program item. The working is simplicity itself but, being more interested in the presentation possibilities...

Here Ken de Courcy took a clever cut effect by Gerald Kosky, changed it, and altered it to make it completely self-contained and also impromptu. Whilst doing this, Ken hit on another use and here you are getting two for the price of one.

EFFECT:

A borrowed pack is shuffled by the owner, then the magician extracts two cards from it, hands the cards to the spectator and asks him to place them into a convenient pocket. The deck is placed on the table and the spectator is requested to cut off about two-thirds and lay it face-up alongside the remainder. He now cuts the larger packet roughly...

An approach to the Paul Curry classic "Out of this World".

Out Of This World, Paul Curry's timeless classic, gets a fresh look in this new manuscript from Australian card man Ian Baxter.

Years after its release, the trick retains its enduring popularity. No sleight of hand, an absence of moves demanding any form of dexterity, with attention to presentation steering the success of this baffling mystery every time. OOTW is a timeless gem. The August 1947 issue of Hugard's Magic Monthly, in a poll conducted at the time by Fred Braue, confirmed to the magic world then that this ingenious card mystery be given the mantle of the most...

Effects with the Zodiac deck. (Deck not included with this PDF.)

Excerpt from the introduction: