Hi, guys

How do you compare these two books?

Which one do you think is the best?

Thanks for the opinions and information.

Cheers,
Andre

I like Power Plays a lot!

BTW Nick is a friend of mine and I can tell you that The Card Magic of Nick Trost is a fantastic book. Get it - and while you're at it, you might pick up Power Plays too.

BTW - The distributor of Power Plays (Murphy's Magic Supplies) is about to run out of stock. I have enough books for my lecture tour in August but it will be out of print by the end of this year, almost certainly.

Mike Powers

Power Plays is great!! I have it and I go back and read a lot of things over just in case I missed something. I don't have Nick Trost's Card Magic book but I've also heard nothing but good things. It wouldn't hurt to have both.

It's a matter of oppinion... If card magic is your thing go for Card Magic of Nick Trost... If you into Close-up then Power Plays is your choice (lots of cool card magic here as well).

BTW - Don't forget that the Café members woted Power Plays the best book 2006.

In the past I have got more out of power plays than Nick's book.

BOTH of these books have material in them that is absolutely top shelf.

I've got both, and would never part with either one.

I've said it before on the Café, but "Power Plays" has some stuff in it that flies so far under the radar that even magi who are up on pretty much every method out there will be stumped after a couple of the more punchy effects

THanks for the opinion guys.
I did read some posts about each book in the Café.
I guess get both would be a good idea

If you have some more opinions, feel free to add them

Thanks
Andre

I would be hard pressed to choose between the two. Both are top notch and contain high caliber material. Why not get both? If you absolutely MUST choose, I would tell you to get Mike's book before it disappears. With the recent re-print of Nick's book you will have a bit more time to pick that one up when you have the funds to do so.

Personally, I don't think these two books are comparable.

I don't own Nick Trost's and I doubt I ever will, specially after having purchased 'Subtle Card Creations' and discovered that there's almost nothing of interest there. I do own Mike Power's "Power Plays" and I can tell you that there's an awful lot of good stuff on it.

Anyhow, I guess that the effects in "Card Magic of Nick Trost" are mostly self working or at least reasonably easy to do, whereas the effects in Mike Power's latest book are a little bit more sleight of hand oriented. There are some based on clever principles as well, but I don't think the effects here can compare to those in Nick Trost's book.

This is like comparing, let's say, "The Complete Works of Derek Dingle" to "Self-Working Card Tricks" by K. Fulves. And I don't think any of these two is better than the other one, they simply aren't comparable.

And of course, I recommend Mike's book with my eyes closed.


Hope it helps,

There's a copy of Powerful Magic by Mike Powers listed in the Let's make a Deal section. This is Mikes first perfect bound book and includes stuff from Marlo and Sankey umong others.
Jeff

This is where you go off the tracks......Trost's first book is nothing like his second book.
That, and the fact you don't own the Trost book makes one wonder how you could possibly have enough information to compare them?

You can certainly like Power Plays (I too think it's one of the best card magic books out there).....but your take on "The Card Magic of Nick Trost" is substantially off base, and not owning the actual book means you really can't comment or compare until you do own (or at least read) "The Card Magic of Nick Trost".

The second Trost book doesn't even enter into this discussion.

Get BOTH. Both books are quality, and both contain some seriously wicked magic. Not to bring up bad memories, but Eric Mead was WAY OFF in his review of Power Plays. I respect Eric Mead as a writer and creator and performer, but when I read the review, I was wondering if he was in fact reviewing a DIFFERENT book.

Mike Powers' name equals strong real world magic.

As for the The Card Magic of Nick Trost, I have to respectfully disagree with double_lift's assessment of it. You can seriously HURT laypersons with quite a few of the effects within. To each her/his own of course, but some of the most powerful magic ever created requires little or no sleight of hand. Think of the effect of Daryl's Untounched for instance: this effect is a strong piece of construction based upon an item Tony Faro published in an early issue of Pabular. And I may be in the minority here, but I like the new Trost book as well. I hope Richard Hatch will be getting the rest of the series done.

There is always room for knucklebusters from Darwin Ortiz, Richard Turner, Jim Swain, Derek Dingle, Wesley James, Gary Darwin and others, and more subtle, less sleight heavy material from Aldo Colombini, Steve Beam, Nick Trost, Karl Fulves, and others. Sleights do not entertain, WE do. God forbid we should judge an effect by the amount of sleights in it. In my opinion, I still think Annemann had it right when he said that effect is everything.

Stewart James and Stewart Judah created some absolutely diabolical magic. Should it be dismissed because it is not chock full of sleights? Check out Stewart James' work just on the Ovette Master Move (a.k.a. Kelly Bottom Placement). Simple sleight that Stewart James found some amazing pathways for.

Not a flame, double_lift, but why limit yourself? Just try doing No Hands Smyth's Myth by Peter Plotkin as published in Apocalypse. Your audience will be shocked at how utter powerful this piece is. Eight Card Brainwave from Nick Trost is of course a classic.

I know some VERY well versed cardmen who have been totally fooled by Steve Beam's material out of the seven volume Semi-Automatic series. J.K. Hartman's stuff is great. It reads dry because of his writing style, but try out UltiMate from Card Dupery Hartman's material requires intermediate skill AT BEST. But like all good creators, he thinks carefully about structure - about the "why", not just the "how".

Sorry for the ramble. I just get a little defencive when I see sleight-light card magic get dismissed as not worth the effort.

Best to all,
Vlad

I really need to ask, how can you make a fair comparison when you don't even have the book.
I do not own Power Plays (heard nothing but good about it though). I do own The Card Magic of Nick Trost and will say it is the best card book I ever owned (Around 500-600 books) and his book Subtle Card Creations is nowhere near as good as his first. Unfortunately most of his good stuff was in # 1.
What I am trying to tell you is "Don't knock it, if you haven't tried it". It is not being fair to a genius such as Mr. Trost.
Rennie

Can you guys give me information about what kind of card magic contained in Card magic of Nick Trost. Mostly self-working or something else ?

Thanks again
Andre

Well, I'm sorry, you Nick Trost fans out there.

Of course, I cannot give an opinion of Nick Trost's book without having read it. That's why I didn't say it is bad or it has nothing but rubbish written on it. I just said two things: ONE, that I don't think I'll buy it after having wasted some money on his second volume and TWO, that I don't think there are many sleight of hand effects on it (based on what I know about Nick Trost, some effects of his I know about and things I've heard).

I just said that I don't think they are comparable, that's all.

And of course that I would recommend Mike Power's book, but I'm entitled to recommend whatever I believe it's a good purchase, am I?

[quote]On 2008-06-10 23:48, andrelimantara wrote:
Can you guys give me information about what kind of card magic contained in Card magic of Nick Trost. Mostly self-working or something else ?

Thanks again
Andre
[/quote
A lot of this book contains effects that use intermediate sleights, nothing too knucklebusting.I agree with most on this thread that the 2nd Trost book doesn't compare well to the first one.The first one is a classic book by anybodies standards.As for Mike Powers' book I have not read it, but after reading this thread it is now on my wanted list.

double_lift,

Of course you are entitled to make recommendations! That is the spirit and purpose of the Café - magicians helping magicians. In turn, many of us are doing the same for you concerning The Card Magic of Nick Trost. The book IS a classic for very good reasons and NONE of those reasons had to do with the fact that it was out of print for a very long time. And you are certainly entitled to forego buying this classic if you so choose - it's your dosh mate

Best,
Vlad

A quote from double_lift
"Anyhow, I guess that the effects in "Card Magic of Nick Trost" are mostly self working or at least reasonably easy to do, whereas the effects in Mike Power's latest book are a little bit more sleight of hand oriented"

Now I have to ask another question,
What is wrong with a self working effect as opposed to a knucklebuster. Do you enjoy doing effects that are difficult, just so you can show your sleights?
I firmly believe in Ted Annemann's quote " The effect is the important thing, how you achieve it is not"
Rennie

The more moves you know, the more items are open to you. Also, knowledgeable and skilled cardmen have more weapons to use when things go wrong. It's good to know moves.

However, there are many self working tricks and tricks that involve only basic moves that are great. I hope no one is using moves for their own sake. Every time you figure out a way to remove a move without sacrificing magic content, the trick becomes better. When you can achieve the same effect with no moves, you reach nirvana.

Mike

These threads are quite useless, and I regret getting involved in it ....but I'll continue anyway.

Mike's "Power Plays" is SO full of great effects and methods, every card guy should at least read it, if not own it (and it's also got other effects in it that aren't cards).

Nick Trosts first book is SO good, every card worker should at least read it, if not own it.
Some of the effects in the Trost book rival ANY card effects anywhere, put out by ANYBODY.

In the end, these are BOTH books you should read, if not own.

But using anything that's in Nick Trosts second book to form an opinion on his first book is ridiculous.
They couldn't be more different if they were written by two different authors with 20 years difference in experience.