Card Dupery by J.K. Hartman

When Hartman meets your deck, first he will teach it to talk—then he will teach it to lie!

Seven years in the making! J. K. Hartman's newest collection of card magic—more than 90 tricks, routines and sleights—over 400 pages and 600 illustrations!

The published history of J. K. Hartman's card dupery began in 1969 and has continued unabated for thirty-eight years, producing along the way three large, significant, and widely respected works: Card Craft, After Craft and Trickery Treats. In the seven years since the appearance of the last Hartman tome, the creative mills have continued to turn, resulting in CARD DUPERY, a collection of more than ninety new card tricks, routines, and sleights. The well-known Hartman touch is ever-present in this new compilation of astonishing effects made possible by elegantly direct methods, extraordinary cunning, and moves within the skill range of the intermediate card-magician. What is more, the ideas and sleights embedded in these duperies have a utility that will inspire the reader toward fresh creations of his own. If this book feels heavy in the hand, it isn't just the paper; there is deep thought and high entertainment packed inside, all carefully and fully explained, with the aid of more than 600 drawings by one of magic's greatest illustrators, J. K. Schmidt.

In these pages you will have delivered to your hands such events as these—

• Someone is asked to separate a mixed deck into black cards and reds, dealing the cards face up—but with his eyes closed. When he opens them, he sees what everyone else has been watching: the piles he has created are a random jumble of colors and he has utterly failed. Or has he? The performer reveals that he has assembled the cards from two decks—and his helper has somehow perfectly separated the cards by their different back patterns!

• Two spectators are each asked to think of a card as the performer spreads through the deck. The cards are shuffled and held behind the performerís back. As he brings out one card at a time, one of the spectators silently spells the name of the card he thought of and slaps his hand down on the card dealt as the last letter of its name. When he turns it up, it is his mental selection! The cards are shuffled further and the second spectator pushes a cocktail sword anywhere into the deck, only to find it lodged exactly where his thought-of card lies!

• Anyone shuffles the deck, cuts it in half and gives one half to the performer. Both of them look through their cards and think of one. The performer shows his selection to someone else to keep things fair. He then deals the top card of his packet face down onto the table, after which the spectator deals his top card face up. They continue to deal cards, the performer always preceding the spectator. When the spectator deals his thought-of card face up, he announces it. The other spectator names the performerís card and, when the top card of his dealt pile is turned up—this card having been dealt just before the spectator dealt his—it is the performer's!

• The performer spreads through a face-up deck, showing it to be in completely random order. Then, without a suspicious move, he widely spreads the deck on the table, showing that the black cards have suddenly separated from the reds!

These effects are the scantest sampling of the wonders in CARD DUPERY to be discovered by you and enjoyed by your audiences.