I pleased to announce that my long awaited book is now finished. The book will be officially released on 10th July at Minds. All that remains is for Phil Smith and then Steve Haresign to work their magic. The price will be revealed soon but expect it to be in the ball park of £45 for the soft cover and £100 for the hard cover collectors edition. As much as I am not a fan of pre-orders I have caved in to pressure and will be taking pre-orders, however not until the book is in a final print ready state. I will not take a single order until I am certain that people will receive their copy exactly when they expect to.

Here is an extract from the foreword by Peter Turner

It is a pleasure, no an honour to be able to write a foreword for this book. Having seen most of the material over the last few years live in all contexts I can guarantee you are in for a treat.

Now to talk about the author - Mark 'shandy pants' Chandaue. Mark is a tinker, tailor, soldier and spy.

He's constantly tinkering with routines in order to make them perfect and then he re-tinkers to go the extra mile. He has a unique style, very artful dodger-esque and his performances are carefully crafted in such a way that each one of them is tailor-made to make his participants experience one they will never forget.

To call him a soldier would be an understatement, he's a veteran and has been in the field longer than I've been on this planet and in this book he is sharing that knowledge.

He's constantly approaching the construction of his routines from a different angle to everyone else, he's as devious as 007.

Here is the table of contents for the soft cover:

Dedication
Foreword - Pete Turner
Foreword - John Carey
Acknowledgements
Introduction

Essay: Ross
An essay about my father

Chandaue Switch
A very clean coin switch

Melt
A two phase coin bend routine

Push
A hands off two phase coin bend routine

First Date
A date prediction

Second Date
A hands off date prediction

Essay: Magicians Guilt

Numbers
A low tech lottery prediction using a real ticket

Pictures
A business card drawing dupe - multiple handling

Nod to Pcket Pete
My take on Nod to pocket watch

Getting to Know You From Memory
My take on Memoria

Essay: Going Pro

Three Phase RPS
- Phase 1 - Rock I win paper you lose
- Phase 2 - Looch RPS
- Phase 3 - Way Out

Essay: Respecting the Art

Lunch for 2
- Lunch paper
- Free lunch
- Positively luncheable

Three Course Lunch
An update to the OTL principle

Essay: Making Sense of it all
- kioku presentation
- Kioku as pre-show

Scrap it principle

Thought Stacking principle
- iunlock presentation
- Starsign stacking

Brain Farts
- Chair Test
- Mapped Out
- Pateo tear Q&A

Commercial Effects
- Glance Pump
- Ring of Prevarication
- iForce Book Test
- Directors Cut
Afterword - Atlas Brookings

The hard cover collectors edition will contain several additional chapters including contributions from some of my friends. This really has been a Labour of love and all of the material is practical and workable. The only brain carts are in the appropriately named chapter.

When I am ready to take pre-order I will be putting up a website for ordering. At that point I will also detail the rewards for pre-ordering.

Mark

Good on you Mark!

Having been privy to the way Mark thinks through a number of forums that we've both frequented over the years I'm excited to see this collection!

Best,

Drew

I've had a sneaky peek at some of the material and we are ALL in for a huge treat with this book Mark is a wonderful thinker and creates some excellent material and presentations!

I too am looking forward to this. Mark is a great thinker.

I'm extremely lucky to have read some chapters from Harpercrown and can only echo what Looch has already said. The effects that I've read have all been solid pieces that have consistently used methods that, to me, were brilliant. The biggest thing that stands out to me though, is that Mark doesn't compromise with anything. Routines can use several methods but run so smoothly and naturally together, they create something much bigger than the sum of their parts. The same goes for the effects too. If there's a weak or transparent link in its method, Mark reworks it until it's invisible. I now approach all effects/routines with the same thinking and I can genuinely say it's changed the way I perform for the better. And this is just from the chapters I've read so far.
I knew of Mark's amazing reputation before I met him or read anything by him. It's not empty hype. If anything, it's understated. I can't wait for Harpercrown to be released. I think it'll be a book that'll be recommended reading for all mentalists for years to come.

I'll be up for a paperback copy for sure..

Do I get an Essex discount? Born in Romford...

No but you'll get a protective cover so you can keep your spray tan off the pages!

What about my Capri and white high heels?

This is an excellent book. Trust me, I know.

Hey guys,

Alex here.

I will be reviewing this book soon.

You are all in for a real treat.

Alex Alejandro

Look forward to it!

I've had the pleasure of Mark personally advising and improving routines for me via PM. His mind is sharp!

Doing my best to save up some $ for the hard cover!!!

Along with some of the other guys who have being privileged to have an insight to both the essays & routines within "Harpercrown", there is much here that you will enjoy immensely! You really can feel Mark's incredible passion for our artform emit from each page. This volume will sit very comfortably amongst my prized possessions that's for sure.

I'm looking forward to it Mark!

Hey guys,

I will be posting my review of this book, of what I have read so far, so it will be around 50% review, and detailed thoughts and views.

Today or tomorrow.

Stay tuned.

Alex

I'm looking forward to it, Alex. The review I mean, as I've edited the book so I know what's in it.

Added to my wishlist!

Will this be a limited run?

It's what I would call a self limiting edition. It's not limited but when the initial run is sold out there would need to be sufficient demand for there to be a second run.

Mark

Hey guys,

So here goes part of my review for this book by Mark Chandaue

I will start with the Introduction:

Here you get to see the reason why Mark decided to write this book, who his greatest inspirations are, and what you can expect from the book.

Chandaue Switch

Very innocent and invisible switch that nobody, I mean nobody will see coming. Peter Turner praises it highly, and I can see why.

How Mark ever came up with this is beyond me, but it looks like you don't do anything and the switch is done.

Melt

Phase 1 Prediction piece where you predict the date of a coin.
Phase 2 Coin is then bent with no apparent moves.

Very workable, easy method, and you get to see all the working behind this.
If you like coin magic, and bending metal, you will love this, since this uses very cleverly the Chandaue Switch that you will learn within the book, that is worth taking a look at.
For coin guys that want to do coin bends, this is very workable.

Push

A great coin bending routine that you can perform on the street or when strolling. You cause 1 coin to bend, then you cause multiple coins to bend at once.

Another coin bend but with a twist.

First Date

This is one that I will be using immediately within my repertoire.

Some change is on the table, you ask a spectator to pick up a coin, and you place the coin inside an envelope.

Inside the envelope is a prediction. You ask the spectator why he chose that coin and not the rest.

At the end, when the coin is taken out with the prediction, the date on the coin matches the prediction.

What I like about this is that you can spin this and make multiple variations that you want. Great routine.

Numbers

Perhaps my favorite routine from the whole book, and one of those worth the price of admission. Well I believe the book is worth the price for learning the Chandaue Switch, this routine, as well as the essays that Mark shares in which he shares a lot of his thinking with us.

In Numbers, yo do not need special props, and you will be doing this. It is a worker.

Numbers connects us all, and this routine you involve multiple spectators, and then after lots of people participate, more people choose digits at random, and they create lottery numbers, and you have predicted everything in advance with a real ticket.

This is a low tech solution to doing Nate Staniforths version, and you will not spend a lot of money, a few bucks and you are all set.

As the WPR guys will say, WORKER OF THE WEEK!!!!!!!!!

Nod to Pocket Pete

Another routine that to me is worth the price.

This is Marks take on Loochs Nod to Pocket Watch routine from his DVD Your thoughts are mine, as well as another principle that he combined from Peter Turner.

This is a stunner. I have already performed it, and it gets gasps.

You are able to accurately predict multiple things. so think of this as Nod to Pocket Watch with a twist, or to the nth degree.

The Scrap It Principle

A great principle that when I read it, it reminded me of something Peter Turner would do.
Great for getting information for free. Another clever principle worth checking out.

that's it for now.......more later



Alex Alejandro