Here are the detailed descriptions for each of the four routines featured in the Four-midable Mental Mysteries e-book.
Psychic Selection
A pack of cards is shuffled by a spectator, replaced in its box to prevent it being tampered with, and then handed back to the spectator for safe keeping.
An important member of the audience is then invited on stage. This person could be a principal guest at a party, the function organiser, or a CEO/owner/director at a business event.
The performer explains that before the show he approached this spectator and invited him to decide on a card, any one of the 52. He asks the volunteer to confirm that no card was suggested to him, that his choice was completely unrestricted and that he has neither written the card name down nor has it been divulged to the performer. The card name resides in his brain alone.
Taking back the shuffled deck from the spectator in the audience, the cards are removed from the box and placed face down on the performer’s palm. The on stage participant is now invited to cut off about half the deck and turning the block of cards face up, to replace it onto the lower face down half of the deck.
Although no one could know which card the helper has cut to, to add a further level of randomness to the selection, the participant is invited to cut the deck again, once more turning the cut away portion over and replacing it.
The performer explains that despite the fact that the deck was shuffled by a fellow spectator, the card in the helper’s mind will have influenced his actions. Spreading to the first face down card, the performer openly removes it and lays it onto the participant’s hand. For the first time, the spectator is invited to announce aloud the card in his mind. When he turns over and displays his random selection from the shuffled deck, it matches!
Mental Coins
Four coins (£2, 2p, 10p and 1p) are placed out in a row on the table and are then covered with a folded handkerchief. Reaching under the cloth, the performer mixes the coins and then removes one which he places sight unseen into his pocket.
The magician selects a spectator and says he will attempt to mentally transfer the name of the removed coin to the helper. Having apparently done so, the mentalist asks the spectator to name which of the three coins he thinks the performer removed. Let’s say he says it’s the £2.
Immediately the performer lifts away the handkerchief to reveal that the 2p, 1p and 10p are still on the table, and reaching into his pocket he removes the £2 placed there moments before. So the spectator is correct.
To prove that this wasn’t just luck the four coins are covered again, then mixed and one removed. Having apparently sent the name of the removed coin to the spectator’s mind, he is invited to announce the coin removed. Let’s imagine he says this time that it’s the 1p.
The cloth is lifted away to reveal that the 1p is the only one missing, the coin itself being immediately brought back out from the pocket.
The process is repeated one final time, and the magician transmits the name of one of the four coins. The spectator says he thinks it is the 2p. But there’s a surprise, because when the cloth is lifted, the only coin on the table is the 2p, as all the other three have completely disappeared.
ESPeriment
A small packet of cards is removed from an envelope and one red backed card is placed sight unseen, in view but face down, on the table. This is the magician’s prediction. The remaining five blue backed cards are shown one at a time to have the five ESP symbols printed on them.
The packet is turned face down and shuffled. A spectator calls out any number from 1-5 and the card lying at that position is dropped out onto the table. On turning it over it is seen to be, for example, the three wavy lines card. Despite the genuine freedom of choice, this card is found to match the red backed prediction.
Spectator Intuition
Six coins are tipped from a purse and one of them is marked with a sticker bearing a spectator’s initials. Turning this coin sticker side downwards, the six coins are mixed around on the table so no one can know which one bears the signed sticker.
The spectator will now try to use his latent intuition to locate the signed coin. First, he is invited to select any three coins, and the other three are returned to the purse. Then he nominates any one of the three coins still on the table, and once again the others are returned to the purse.
Despite the genuine freedom of choice, when the spectator himself turns over his selection, he discovers it is indeed his initialled coin!
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