Dan Baines' "A Book at Midnight" Effect

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Anthony Blake
Posts: 78
Joined: January 18th, 2008, 12:00 pm
Location: CA

Dan Baines' "A Book at Midnight" Effect

Postby Anthony Blake » March 30th, 2013, 6:41 am

I received my copy of Dan Baines' (Lebanon Circle Magic) new effect titled "A Book at Midnight" (ABaM)... this is the first in a series for this effect and it's theme is H.P. Lovecraft... I used it last night for the first time and it's a really powerful effect...

"ABaM" is a combination mentalism & bizarre story magic effect... it revolves around 24 specially created bookmarks, each with a title of one of H.P. Lovecraft's books... 2 spectators are used, each gets 12 book marks and by imagining the the face of a clock choose a time and in turn select that many bookmarks from their own pile... both sets of bookmarks are gathered and mixed (by the spectators themselves) and then handed to the magician who shows each bookmark slowly to each spectator whereby they are supposed to remember the name of the book in coordination with the time they chose... in the end both spectators actually pick the same book title...

"ABaM" is an effective effect but also incredibly simple to perform... in fact once you learn the one "move" you need to do you can do the effect almost immediately... the move is not a knuckle-buster sleight, just a very simple displacement... the beautiful thing about this effect is that you can't really mess it up, the bookmarks are fairly mixed and the effect will still work if the bookmarks were dropped on the floor... it's self-working...

The H.P. Lovecraft version is the first in a series... the next release will be based on Edgar Allen Poe followed by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle... they plan several more releases after that... each set of bookmarks can be used on their own or can be combined together to make a larger set with more variables... The printing on the bookmarks is extremely nice, in full color and on thick card stock... the packaging is very nice too (something that Lebanon Circle does well), the bookmarks come inside a metal tin which is in turn inside a nice, magnetic latch presentation box, inside the presentation box is a DVD that shows the workings of the effect along with extra ideas on how to use the props... "ABaM" is priced at £34.99 ($53US) and shipping is £5.99 ($9US)...

One of the nice things about this effect is that it can be used either as a mental effect or as part of a bizarre magic presentation... in fact there's a way to create an even stronger mental effect by using a NW to add a topper to the presentation... I'm very happy with this product and look forward to the rest in the series... Dan does incredible work and his products are not only artistically pleasing (if you like dark, spooky stuff) but precision made by a true magic prop craftsman... My investment in this effect was well worth it (especially as part of my Dr. Fez mental act)...

Here's a link to the "ABaM" page: http://www.lebanoncircle.co.uk/ABaM.html

Success!!!

Tony Blake
The Thoughtreader
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PS: The principle behind this effect can be applied to a wide variety of presentations... I made up a set of cards with different "emotion" terms written on them and it's quite effective... I can see me using the same principle with special cards made up for corporate engagements...

Max Maven
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Joined: January 17th, 2008, 12:00 pm
Location: Hollywood, CA
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Re: Dan Baines' "A Book at Midnight" Effect

Postby Max Maven » March 30th, 2013, 7:58 am

The principle behind this effect can be applied to a wide variety of presentations...


Need. It is known as the Transposed Card Principle, much explored by Walter Gibson and Stewart James, among others. (See, for example, SJ's "Split Second" in the December 1962 New Tops. The name comes from its appearance in Hoffmann's Modern Magic (1876), but recent research published in Gibecière tracks it back to Minguét in 1755.

The graphics on the website look very nice.

Jonathan Pendragon
Posts: 394
Joined: July 13th, 2010, 7:33 am

Re: Dan Baines' "A Book at Midnight" Effect

Postby Jonathan Pendragon » August 21st, 2013, 6:25 am

Is there a Necronomicon that comes with it? I think not.


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