Magic Tricks

I am going to start out with stating the fact that "Modern Coin Magic / The New Modern Coin Magic" by J.J. Bobo have recently been "called out" or "de-throned" as the "Bible" of coin magic. This has come up more often in the last year or two by many (Most notably Curtis Kam on his Reel Magic Series and Rick Holcombe on his YouTube channel). This is not to say that Bobo's Book does not contain very powerful effects and sleights, just that there are now some better out there and it contains outdated material.

It does not leave a lot out there as far as "large" coin magic books like "Expert Coin Magic" and "Coin Magic" by Richard Kaufman. There are some very good / great underground to notable smaller books also and recently we got a decent sized book about the coin magic of Geoff Latta that has been well received.

Now enter Dr. Michael Rubinstein's enormous tome - "Rubinstein Coin Magic". I was one of the lucky few to have pre-ordered directly from Michael before it was even in his hands from the printers and even luckier to get mine he Friday of Memorial Day Weekend (before he was asked, or told, not to ship any more until the official release date) so I have been able to read it in it's entirety and re-read parts of special interest to me.

I will say, along with many of the more seasoned and well read contributors, who had early paper edit copies, that this book is certainly a contender for the title. It will most likely be the new "must have" for anyone serious about coin magic. The book is huge, well written, easy to understand as well as follow along and the photos are incredibly well taken from the proper angles. The work that went into producing this book must have been mind numbing (which is ok because we will enter the "Twilight Zone" as well as alternate realities of it. That means a few different methods for those not familiar with his famed effect he performed on "Penn and Teller's Fool Us". One of the versions is brand new and never seen print before (hint, it is one of my favorites in the book).

Along with routines, he teaches many of his sleights from the years of working with them and I was pleasently surprised that the first to be taught is "R.O.P.S." and I have not quite been doing it right for a long time. I am working on fixing that with a good bit of success using his stp by step teaching in the book rather than following my old dvd too quickly and missing some important elements of the move.

If you have ever seen him perform, you will surely know that he doesn't let a good (or bad) pun go to waste. It is his character. Not the one he plays, it is too genuine to not be a real endearing part of him. Luckily, He has devoted a chapter to his favorite puns which you can read to use, read to enjoy or skip it entirely (without any of it accidentally "shtick-ing" to you).

If you are serious about wanting to do great coin magic based on his works and the many other great coin magicians who added contributions, this really is a "must have". It covers a lifetime of work from one of the first coin guys to put out a VHS series back in the day and being a force behind the scenes of the 16 vol "New York Coin Magic Seminar" DVD series.

I will leave you with this... Buy the book, it is already almost sold out and awaiting a second printing. For more in-depth reviews, check the Magic Cafe and similar forums as I am sure they will be popping up as others make their way thru the book. Give them time, it is a big one, but you will not go wrong getting this book.