Reviews: Read What Others Are Saying: page 5
213 ★★★★★ reviews
145 ★★★★★ reviews
90 ★★★★★ reviews
130 ★★★★★ reviews
The Professional Smoking Thumb Gimmick (Instructions)
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Allard Robichaud (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Wednesday 19 March, 2025)
Excellent!!! Fast service! Works all fine!
Double Cross ACAAN
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Kevin Needham (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Tuesday 18 March, 2025)
Another great effect from a brilliant creator! An impromptu twist of his effect called “Duplicity”. It can be performed over video or in person. There is an explanation on how to do the effect with one deck as well. Highly Recommended!!
The Holy Dixie Cup
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Jacob Johnson (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 March, 2025)
This is a fun and clever effect! The explanation is clear and concise. The move will not take long to learn and will be quite an effective tool in your toolbox. I only gave it 4 stars because the link in the PDF to a YouTube video demonstrating the "move" was dead. The video isn't necessary but would have been the icing on the cake.
Magic no Mystery
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 March, 2025)
A beautiful read with many hidden wonders waiting to be rediscovered.
Napkin Folding
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 March, 2025)
Could maybe use an update, but still a clever, workable routine similar to Chapeaugraphy.
2 As 4 Count
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Barrett Sweet (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Thursday 13 March, 2025)
Excellent!
Wayne Dobson: The Definitive Collection
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Gregg Webb
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Thursday 13 March, 2025)
A friend loaned me this book to read, and I'd like to say that it is one of the best magic books I've ever read. Before his unfortunate handicap, he was a working pro, so he knew what worked in the real world, and he had the knack of making something catchy and his patter ideas were perfect. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in magic as one of the only books you need to own and study. Gregg Webb
The AI Magician's Handbook
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by John Kauth (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Tuesday 11 March, 2025)
Marko's book description is accurate. AI is the latest buzzword on the internet. AI apps start off with a description of what the AI is supposed to produce. These descriptions are called "prompts". There is an old computer programming adage, "Garbage in, garbage out." Bad prompts produce bad AI results. That is the value of Marco's book. He uses several magic tricks as examples that are copied into an AI app to create original presentations. He describes how to modify the prompts for various audiences. As with any presentation created by a human or AI the final result will need to be edited. Marco supplies links to two excellent AI apps to create presentations. This is the first AI book I have found that explicitly applies to magic. Marko's book is an excellent introduction to the topic.
The book falls short on music creation. It is only two pages long, and the prompts are brief and not as detailed as the performance prompts. Only one AI app is listed, and Marco stresses that most AI music apps cost money. There is an invaluable link to the legalities of using AI music in performances.
Chris Wasshuber runs a wonderful website with tons of useful information. In his review guidelines, he suggests leaving some brief bio information in the magic reviews. I am 76 years old. Five years ago, a cruise ship had a magic show. I purchased his promotional kit with a few tricks. The magic bug bit hard. I now own the Tarbell books, 13 Steps to Mentalism, and many, many books and videos on Magic and Mentalism, which I have studied. I lean toward Mentalism as fancy sleight of hand is difficult with arthritis. I mainly do thirty-minute shows for senior citizens living in my area.
Twisting Version 50
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Daniel Vicars (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Saturday 08 March, 2025)
Pure Pellikaan Prestidigitation! I'm gonna love frying folks' brains with this.
Another Roadside Attraction
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Frank Machniak (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Saturday 08 March, 2025)
The work of Jon Racerbuamer is legendary. And to have it in this form is just wonderful. The quality and service are first rate.
Lucky Card: a hands-off ACAAN miracle
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Kevin Needham (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Thursday 06 March, 2025)
A powerful effect with a personal meaning for the spectator. Much thought and time was spent in order to make this possible!
Yet ANOTHER HIT for this author. Be on the lookout for his work…HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
The Ultimate ACAAN: the holy grail of card magic
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Kevin Needham (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Tuesday 04 March, 2025)
This really seems impossible! The spectator not only FREELY selects a card but also a position and the card appears in that position. Easy to perform and the method is absolutely brilliant! Highly recommend.
ACAAN Time
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Kevin Needham (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Monday 03 March, 2025)
Excellent effect! Brilliant method!! Highly recommended!!!
Generate: a new era of ACAAN
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Kevin Needham (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Thursday 27 February, 2025)
Very cool effect. Simple and easy to perform.
Clever Card Conjuring
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Sunday 23 February, 2025)
Can’t beat 6 bucks. Lay out is a bit funky, but still accessible. Get closer to your local stripper.
On Thin Air: Levitation
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Sunday 23 February, 2025)
The build is definitely a build. As a machinist, I doubt I’ll ever take the time to build this, let alone perform it. BUUUUUUT, still an interesting take on a strolling levitation.
Bath Towel Mentalism: on steroids
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by hal barlow (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Thursday 20 February, 2025)
The ad copy should tell you that you need to buy 2 gimmicked decks and one regular deck. [Lybrary.com: Strictly speaking one can get the necessary cards in one particular gimmicked deck plus one regular deck.]
Balloon Comedy and Magic
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 February, 2025)
Well written, a nice little addition to any ballon worker's book shelf.
Mathematical Three Card Monte
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 February, 2025)
Nice little bit with many possibilities.
Day One
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 February, 2025)
Still requires a bit of math and memory, but a lot less than others. May be worth it, but I’m still looking for something simpler.
A Call To Palms
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by jordan Byrd (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Friday 14 February, 2025)
Beautifully written. Worth the read. RIP
The Elusive Canary
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by David Nethery (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Tuesday 11 February, 2025)
This book, The Elusive Canary - (The Vanishing Bird Cage) The Last Word In Cages by Mystic Craig (with assistance from Jean Hugard) has long been somewhat elusive itself. The book was originally self-published in 1936 and sold for $2.00. Today in 2025 it is not unusual to see a copy going for $65 or more. Many thanks to Lybrary.com for making it available. Mystic Craig's real name was William M. Vagell.
Those magicians who have a particular interest in the classic effect, The Vanishing Bird Cage, will be the primary audience for this book. I for one am glad to have access to this rare book as an e-book edition through Lybrary.com. For what it is as a historical piece , I'm rating this book 5-stars, but potential buyers should be aware that it is a slender volume (23 pages) and the subtitle: “The Last Word On Cages” is a bit of an exaggeration on the part of the author. It is not a comprehensive treatment on all the various methods and types of vanishing bird cages that had been used from the time of Buatier De Kolta (the inventor of the effect) to the time when the book came out (in 1936). It is mostly the author's own particular handling for the effect and a few novel ideas he had for enhancing the effect. Although, at the time (and in the years since then) you could almost say it was the ONLY word on the vanishing bird cage, as very little detailed information has ever been put into print on this delightful, but difficult to perform feat of magic. Most information on performing the vanishing bird cage effect -- the 'real work' on the cage -- has been passed along in person from magician to magician or in the occasional article published in magazines such as Linking Ring or M-U-M. In the present day I would say “the last word on cages” is to be found in John Carney’s outstanding book Sleights and Insights in his chapter on 'The Vanishing Bird Cage Revisioned', which at 27 pages is longer than The Elusive Canary. John Carney also covers much of the same material from his book Sleights and Insights in a video tutorial which is also titled 'The Vanishing Bird Cage Revisioned'. (Available to purchase from John Carney on his website)
At any rate, I appreciate Mystic Craig’s book The Elusive Canary , even if it falls a bit short of being “THE Last Word On Cages”. It contains some valuable information on the vanishing bird cage, so for the vanishing bird cage aficionado I would recommend it as a historical curiosity worth reading. It is rumored that master craftsman James P. Riser (whose vanishing bird cages are regarded as among the best ever made) has a book in the works about The Vanishing Bird Cage, which, if he ever publishes it, may likely be The Last Word On Cages.
Darwin's Aces
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Vincent Mepstead (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Sunday 09 February, 2025)
Darwin Ortiz mastered great control with a deck of cards. He was renowned for casino-type card magic showing great control in a normal deck of cards as this trick shows. He will be sorely missed.
Empty Multiple Out Envelope
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Karsten Meyerhoff (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Monday 03 February, 2025)
As far as the facts are concerned, there is nothing much to add to the ad-copy: The thing is what the text claims it is and it works the way it is described. What I really like about this envelope is that you can take a wide variety of envelopes and make it into a multiple out envelope. There are a few very minor restrictions ("this has to be straight-edged as opposed to round, this works better with a pattern" - that sort of thing) but nothing you can't easily work around. I would imagine, though, that envelopes that have the flap on the narrower side (think: pay envelope) are a bit more difficult to handle since you have to reach inside the envelope to show it empty.
That means: You can have your own envelopes that look like absolutely normal envelopes in your country or region of the world - with respect to size, aspect ratio, colours and all. Believe you me: It does make a difference, if audiences do not immediately suspect an envelope to be a prop. Even if they don't exactly know, how it works: A perceived prop is a perceived prop is a perceived prop.
Moreover, the envelopes are dirt-cheap, since you really just use ordinary envelopes from your local super-market or stationary store. That may even shine a different light on the price some may consider to be a bit stiff.
Although this applies to most of the envelopes I know, make sure you buy envelopes where even one layer of paper is completely opaque, even against the light. Most envelopes are produced that way, of course, since it's the very purpose of an envelope to conceal what's inside. Well, just saying ...
As far as the size of the compartments is concerned: They are almost as large as the envelope and if we talk billets or banknotes or playing cards, you can easily fit a few of them in each of the compartments. The absolute size of the envelope doesn't matter, neither does the aspect ratio, so you can produce ones that are good for close-up as well as larger ones for parlour-type settings. The only (theoretical) restriction I can think of, is: You want to open the envelope to show it's empty at some point, so, anything larger than 2 by 3 meters may feel a little awkward ;-)
You need no sticky stuff (neither for assembly nor for operation), so each envelope will last you as long as an envelope lasts. I am sure, you make envelopes out of Tyvek, if that is a concern to you. As far as DIY is concerned: You can handle a pair of scissors? You're good, you'll make a new envelope from two regular envelopes in under a minute.
The instructions are crystal clear and easy to follow, what more can you say about them? Even if you don't speak English well, I guess you could follow from just watching.
Unknown Mentalist Product Guide 1
Overall customer rating: ★★★★★reviewed by Brad Smithart (confirmed purchase)
Rating: ★★★★★ (Date Added: Thursday 30 January, 2025)
I don't know who he is, but the Unknown Mentalist has published a large number of products on lybrary.com, so it's good to have a checklist to keep track of everything.