Thanks Dorian, glad you are enjoying. We spent a lot of time working on both the system and the effects. Glad to hear you picked up on it! 😀

I feel like this should really read "to discover A card/position relationship..." or am I wrong?

Lemniscate asked:
He is, of course, correct. There are almost always multiple ways to arrive at the same destination (though generally one is simpler than another).

Just finished the book. I will post my review soon.

Very good material

(sorry for my bad english, I am french... nobody's perfect I know...)

First of all, let me say that this is a wonderful book.

The stack is really easy to master. Once the “rule” is known, and when the exceptions (rogue cards) are known, everything is good to go. Then, you have to order your cards in The Solution order a few times in a row, and everything is stick into your memory, unforgettable.

Once you know the stack, that’s nice because even if you don’t remember a card to position, or vice-versa, you can always refer to the mathematical rule and remember the card or the position. That is a really good point. The only downside is that few effects are specific to « The Solution », except an effect called « Go Figure », specifically designed for mentalists. Two cards are simply thought of by the spectator, who holds the cards in his hands, and the mentalist can then reveal them, after a game of truth/lie. Ok, it’s not THAT clean, there is a small downside that I won’t reveal here but you need an extra piece of information, which is justified by your patter.

More generally, the book is extremely well written, everything is extra clear, full of examples, explanations, re-examples, re-explanations, in order to make sure that we have understood everything. A lot of text, a lot of humour, summaries, etc. A pleasure to read because we understand the birth of this memorized deck, and the reasons for its actual order. I had not seen a text that clear and that pleasant to read in a long time.

Concerning the other effects, there are good, and doable with any stack :

Simple Peek and Reveal: a classic, but what makes the effect good is the text given by Atlas which is genius ! Any mentalist will love it.
The Blackpool ACAAN: quite ok, but traditional method that always works. The effect on the spectator is killer.
Beating the Spread: mix of prediction and ACAAN. Really nice, an ACAAN remastered for the mentalists.
DareDevil: a sort of OP performed by the mentalist, quite good.
Dead Cut Count: the human weight, classical, but efficient.
Equilibrium: well thought of routine, with a very clever peek. I will use it.
The 7-Eleven Run: some fishing, for a hard hitting effect.

To summarize, a wonderful book, clearly illustrated, with enjoyable texts and full of humour!
Nice presentations / texts / plots designed for the mentalists around there.
A easy-to-remember memorized deck, that is impossible to forget if you practice with it, and even after, because of the logic behind it ! A very nice principle hidden into “The Solution”.
Apart from that, few effects are specific to The Solution, that’s why it is only a stack interesting for mentalists and people not keen on poker demonstrations / cheating / magic effects / spelling effects / prediction effects that you can do with Aronson of Mnemonica for instance. I think The Solution is a very good compromise if you want to learn a memorized deck, rememberit for a long time, without the need to perform a lot of effects with it. All the effects using a memorized deck, but which are not stack-specific, will be doable with The Solution, and that’s nice.

Congrats Atlas and Raven !

Again, it would be particularly helpful if those who review this book could let us know just how long it took them to memorize the stack (exception cards and all) to the point where they could do it reliably in public.

Incidentally, I have much (mostly good) to say about the value of algorithmic stacks in my essay on the topic of full-deck stacks.

Hope this helps

Steve

I would also be curious as to how this compares with more traditional and the well known stacks?

In about 24 hours I had the stack memorized. One more day for the excpetions, and not it's fine, I know the stack and feel confident about using it, despite it's not my "main" stack (Isis being the one I use).

Steven - Your memorization time is pretty well in there with other times that have been reported back and that I've seen personally when I have taught how the Solution works.

Dorian - Thanks very much for your feedback. I'm very pleased that you enjoyed the book. I will note, however, that the Blackpool ACAAN also does have an approach which is Solution specific as well.

Doug - I've said this before in this thread, but your website is a wealth of information and anyone would benefit from visiting it.

Best,

Atlas

Atlas,

The Karma Deck claims to be a "5 minute memorythmic deck system" that is very easy to learn. Are you able to give us an idea of how the Solution is easier and faster to learn?

Thanks,

Clark

Hi Clark,

I don't want to reveal too much about the Karma deck, nor do I want to suggest that it isn't a useful system. But it isn't a deck that I would ever show a participant face up.

There are lots of deck orders that are easily memorized - for instance: the Ace through King of Clubs, then Ace through King of Hearts, then Ace through King of Spades, then Ace through King of Diamonds. Some quick thinking would tell you which card was at a number and vice versa. But it isn't a deck you'd ever be able to let a participant handle.

The Solution is something that I have no qualms letting a participant handle, and is quick to memorize.

Best,

Atlas

Thanks, Atlas. That was helpful

Clark

In that respect how is it different than say Quickerstack? it looks random but there's some simple rule to associate the card with a number...

Dyment himself considers the QuickerStack 'middle ground' in terms of randomness. Being tetradistic, if you faro shuffle it twice, the end result will be thirteen four-of-a-kinds.

That does not apply to The Solution.

Dorian, glad you enjoyed it and thank you for a wonderful and thorough review!

Has my copy been posted yet, I am eagerly awaiting its arrival?

Hi Daren,

Yes - your copy has shipped.

Best,

Atlas

Fab!!!!

Nicolino observed:
Exactly. QuickerStack and The Solution take two quite different approaches to the creation of an algorithmic stack. The Solution is much like the Bart Harding stack, in that the goal was to create a sequence in which any ordering in completely undetectable. I think the Harding stack is more random in appearance, as it doesn't take too much inspection of The Solution to see that it's not a random sequence. But both are fine in the absence of quite careful inspection, and I suspect that The Solution is more easily learned. The downside of this approach is that nobody has ever figured out a way to do this without having a goodly number of cards that are exceptions to the algorithm (making it more difficult to acquire and easier to forget from lack of use).

QuickerStack was designed to be -- in addition to a memorized deck -- a more broadly useful tool for card work. To that end, I took the admonition of Alan Ackerman (a much more experienced card user than I ever expect to be), who believes that "the tetradistic stack is the strongest of all stacks." Others whom I admire that made exclusive use of tetradistic stacks include Chan Canasta, Stewart James, and Gene Anderson. A tetradistic stack can't be handed out for such careful examination, but looks very random during normal performance. And the obvious upside for QuickerStack is that every single card in the sequence uses the identical algorithm: there are no "exceptions" to the rule.

So, as with most things, there is no "best": classical mnemonics-based and rule-based stacks have their advantages as well. No solution does everything well. It's really important to figure out what your personal needs/goals happen to be, and choose a solution that best matches same.