Price$22.00
Media TypeBook
CategoryClose Up
Date AddedApr 15, 2009
The Plot Thickens
Oliver Meech
(Based on 2 reviews)
- Online Visions
"Buy this book! Highly Recommended."
- Genii Online
"A breath of fresh air."
- MAGIC magazine
"Unusual plots, simple methods, great ideas - why aren't you ordering this book right now?"
- Magicseen
"For...less than the price of a one trick DVD, this really is an excellent purchase."
- Magicweek
Magicians experience a torrent of new methods but just a trickle of new plots. It's time for a change. And the change starts here!
22 fresh plots with everything from bottles to bubbles and photos to false teeth, including:
- Invisible Man: Convince a spectator that they've vanished.
- Flaming Voodoo: A spectator stares at a piece of paper he is holding and it bursts into flames.
- Touching Transposition: Forget sight, fool their sense of touch.
- X-ray Coin: A spectator swallows an initialed coin and it appears on an X-ray of their stomach.
- Secret Service Load: Divine the serial number of a bill in the spectator's wallet without ever going near it.
- Plus 17 more impossibilities.
87 large format pages. 86 photo illustrations. Perfect bound with a glossy cover.
Reviews
(Top ▲)
"Can you convince someone that they've vanished? Paul Harris posed this intriguing question in 'Nowhere Man' in The Art of Astonishment Book 3 and it set me thinking. This is the routine that I came up with. I'm sure there are more tricks waiting to be developed using his novel plot."
How's that for the opening statement of a trick? Oliver Meech's book is a top quality production. The above quote is from his effect Invisible Man, the first effect in the book. The premise of the book is that Oliver wants to focus on new or largely untapped plots. His basic thesis is that we spend plenty of time on method and presentational ideas in the published works of today, so focus on new effects instead.
This is quite an ambitious goal. Whether he achieved that goal or not I'll leave up to you. And you should make a decision which means I think you should buy this book. The effects are great, and the methods are even better. On top of that Oliver really has fun with his readers.
Each effect, Oliver gives the "spectator" a different name. The name is somehow linked to the effect. Part of your job as the reader is to find the link. Don't fret. If you give up, the answers are in the back. He also takes the time to explain a few minor language differences between the UK and US... for example, in the U.K. what I would call a soda is called a "Fizzy Drink."
Also, Oliver is a lefty (no wonder he's brilliant). Knowing, however, that his main readership would likely be righties, he mirror-imaged all the photos to properly reflect a righty's perspective. The whole production is very thoughtful and thought provoking, and it's clear he took the time to develop this properly. He also does an excellent job with credits.
So... let me give you a sense of what's going on in Oliver's head. He has an effect called "Touching Transposition." This effect is a transposition of two objects (a coin and a sugar cube). However, rather than using a visual illusion, he uses a tactile illusion. The audience actually feels the sugar cube in his hand as it's vanishing... It's very strange and very clever.
There are just a ton of great ideas in this book, and the writing style and thinking is just plain different from a lot of what we see today in the magic market. It's worth picking up just for that.
How's that for the opening statement of a trick? Oliver Meech's book is a top quality production. The above quote is from his effect Invisible Man, the first effect in the book. The premise of the book is that Oliver wants to focus on new or largely untapped plots. His basic thesis is that we spend plenty of time on method and presentational ideas in the published works of today, so focus on new effects instead.
This is quite an ambitious goal. Whether he achieved that goal or not I'll leave up to you. And you should make a decision which means I think you should buy this book. The effects are great, and the methods are even better. On top of that Oliver really has fun with his readers.
Each effect, Oliver gives the "spectator" a different name. The name is somehow linked to the effect. Part of your job as the reader is to find the link. Don't fret. If you give up, the answers are in the back. He also takes the time to explain a few minor language differences between the UK and US... for example, in the U.K. what I would call a soda is called a "Fizzy Drink."
Also, Oliver is a lefty (no wonder he's brilliant). Knowing, however, that his main readership would likely be righties, he mirror-imaged all the photos to properly reflect a righty's perspective. The whole production is very thoughtful and thought provoking, and it's clear he took the time to develop this properly. He also does an excellent job with credits.
So... let me give you a sense of what's going on in Oliver's head. He has an effect called "Touching Transposition." This effect is a transposition of two objects (a coin and a sugar cube). However, rather than using a visual illusion, he uses a tactile illusion. The audience actually feels the sugar cube in his hand as it's vanishing... It's very strange and very clever.
There are just a ton of great ideas in this book, and the writing style and thinking is just plain different from a lot of what we see today in the magic market. It's worth picking up just for that.
(Top ▲)
This is one of those books you'll either love or hate. I prefer to think of this type of book as a fire-starter. I'm not saying you should burn this book, but instead it's one of those that just might start you thinking if you take the effects listed and improve on them. It just might jump-start your imagination.
While I did love some of the effects in here, there are a few you'll honestly never perform. They are more oddities than actual magic, or else they're more fun than magical. "Invisible Man" is a nice little routine that will really fool the spectator, but not the folks in the crowd around him. It gets a laugh all around though, so there's a good point for it. There is also a nice little coin routine in which a drawing of a fish jumps from one side of the coin into the fishbowl on the other side while the coin is spinning around. There are even a few card tricks thrown in here.
The strength of this book comes more from the range of material than the actual material itself. It is safe to say just about any magician who buys this book will find at least one or two routines they'll use for themselves. Unfortunately, I don't think anyone would build an entire repertoire from it. But as I stated earlier, many of these routines can easily be adapted to your individual style. You may not perform them as they are in the book, but you might get inspiration from the handling in a particular effect that can be used in something else.
At about $1 a trick, this book is a fun diversion and nice investment if you're looking for something a little different.
While I did love some of the effects in here, there are a few you'll honestly never perform. They are more oddities than actual magic, or else they're more fun than magical. "Invisible Man" is a nice little routine that will really fool the spectator, but not the folks in the crowd around him. It gets a laugh all around though, so there's a good point for it. There is also a nice little coin routine in which a drawing of a fish jumps from one side of the coin into the fishbowl on the other side while the coin is spinning around. There are even a few card tricks thrown in here.
The strength of this book comes more from the range of material than the actual material itself. It is safe to say just about any magician who buys this book will find at least one or two routines they'll use for themselves. Unfortunately, I don't think anyone would build an entire repertoire from it. But as I stated earlier, many of these routines can easily be adapted to your individual style. You may not perform them as they are in the book, but you might get inspiration from the handling in a particular effect that can be used in something else.
At about $1 a trick, this book is a fun diversion and nice investment if you're looking for something a little different.