Setting a Magic Set

So, for some wild reason, you feel the need to put together a magic kit for someone you really like.   Rather than going out and laying down a couple of bills on an “executive magic kit” (as you can find various places),  here’s what I’d do:

In

• A nice leather briefcase,

put:

• A copy of Mark Wilson’s Complete Course In Magic,  by Mark Wilson.  Softcover is in print, but hardcover copies in good condition are available very inexpensively from any used-book shop — and you can get an autographed and personalized copy direct from Mark, so that’s the way I’d go.

Then the following gear:

• Two decks of Bicycle Rider-back poker sized cards, one red, one blue.  Available from any variety store.
• Six American half-dollars, reasonably well-matched in appearance.  Get the kind with an eagle on the back.  $3.00 at any bank.
• Two old-fashioned English pennies, the ones that are the same size as half-dollars.  You can get these for dollars at a magic shop, or for pennies at a coin shop.  You aren’t looking for collectibles.
• A box of 1.5″ Goshman super-soft sponge balls, available from any magic shop.  They come four-to-the box, and are very inexpensive.
• The Professor’s Nightmare, a rope trick, available at any magic shop.
• The Twentieth Century Silks.  Available at any magic shop.
• A set of cups-and-balls (available at any magic shop).
• A set of 4″ or 5″ linking rings.  Any magic shop.
• An Okito coin box.  Any … do I need to say it?

A packet trick.  Choose one from among:

• Entourage,
• B’Wave,
• Twisted Sisters,

or

• Skinner’s Ultimate 3-Card Monte.

You can get ’em at any magic shop.

That briefcase will probably be the most expensive thing on the list.

Other books might include:  Modern Coin Magic by J. B. Bobo.  The Royal Road to Card Magic by Jean Hugard and Frederick Braue.  Magic and Showmanship by Henning Nelms.  Close-up Magic Secrets by Diamond Jim Tyler. Get ’em at any bookstore.