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Best source is your local SAM or IBM club or magic shop. They will probably be the ones sponsoring the lectures.

Check out tool boxes at your local Home Depot to Lowes. I picked up an aluminum briefcase style box there a couple of years ago. You can also find aluminum hard cases on Amazon like THIS. I also have used an old hard side leather briefcase. You can also search online for ATA cases which are...

In thinking about emotion, meaning and stories, I think it is important to understand what makes a good story. Read The Brothers Grimm, The Book of Virtues and anything on folklore, mythology or parables. One great soure for stories and humor is Reader's Digest. Read books about theories of...

I guess it depends on how good your fake stories are. The stories I tell often are fictional, but I an able to write and tell a story with emotion. I think that the story definitely needs to be interesting, but I don't agree about it needing to be short. Most of my routines are done to stories...

I find I find the motivations for what I do in my script which usually consists of a story. Some motivations are found under the cover of other natural actions - doing a steal as part of squaring a deck.

Can you do it any slower? ;)

@Lord Magic I did see your mention of books and took it as a secondary reference with YouTube being your primary source of inspiration and learning. If I'm mistaken then I apologize. We will have to agree to disagree on the value of YouTube. Let me just tell you that if you meet any...

Good luck. Let us know how it goes.

Actually, in the effect I described above, I switched out the force deck for a regular deck as they were looking at their card. I use it in that effect because I like having the card picked from a tabled spread. I don't use them that often because I can do a pretty good classic force. Oh, and...

@Tecum , I actually DO think that a performance should have a variety of emotions or "texture" as I said in my original post. My point in what you quoted is that you can't have a bunch of tricks without any presentation other than "look at this" and then do a very emotional piece.

"That one was easy to figure out. You spread the cards on the table and one card was exposed a little more than the other so I would pick it. I just played along and picked it." I was using a force deck.

Focus that thinking on two things - what people like about you and what you like. Ask your wife and kids what they like best about you - I suspect you know the answer without asking. Then think about what you like with a focus on characters. Favorite books, favorite movies, favorite television...

I think that in a stage or parlor show, music can add to emotion if used right. I use different instrumental music as a background for each effect. The music matches the emotion. The start of the music cues the audience in that something magical is about to happen. The effect needs to be timed...

For less than $15, Mark Wilson's Complete Course has a bunch of betcha tricks in it as well as a whole encyclopedia of all sorts of other magic. Also, check out Paul Harris's Art of Astonishment books. A little more advanced, but great stuff.

Ian: Being a bit older just means you are a bit smarter then all the kids around here.:p Card College is amazingly well done. It has diagrams in the front of your hands and the deck so you can understand the terminology used throughout the book. Each section has written explanations as well...

Get it. Now.

Linking Rings (Dai Vernon's Symphony of the Rings; Levent's DVDs are amazing) Billiard Balls (Alan Wakeling's Version is the Best, Levant's DVDs are amazing) Rope (Rich Sander's Fiber Optics - I've always thought that would be great to the old Pink Panther theme) Zombie Ball (PM me for ball...

Get Wayne Dobson's WD-40. There is a lot of practical stand-up card magic there with great scripting.

Don't start with 13 Steps. Start with Bob Cassidy's FundaMentals. It is on lybrary.com. Even better, start here: http://www.lulu.com/us/en/shop/p-craig-browning/mentalism-introduction-resource-list/ebook/product-15574606.html

Go watch the first 8 minutes of the Pixar movie Up. Not a word said, but when I saw that every adult in the audience was on the verge of tears. The same with the incinerator scene in Toy Story 3. Why? The stories touched us because of a familiarity with our own experiences and our emotions. Up...