We have been a fan of David Copperfield since his early days. We anticipated his television specials with the same excitement as we did with Doug Henning. These were two men with a demonstrable love for the artform around which we focused our life.
How great would it be to be either man. Have trucks, busses, roadies, technical experts and assistants working with a common cause — to entertain with the most entertaining art of all, Magic.
Given our past as prologue for this review, you can probable guess where we are heading.
We ordered our book from Amazon the day Mr. Copperfield announced it would be ready months later. Those months between our order and the book’s arrival seemed to tick slowly by. We wanted that book, we needed that book.
It arrived and we were then filled with apprehension and anxiety. What if the book was not all that we hoped. What if it was a flimsy (but hardbound) review of Magic’s history starting with tricks we already knew started our art and ending as a promotional piece for Mr. Copperfield?
We decided to cast our anxiety to the wind. This is tough to do in a small apartment located over the place where they bake dog treats here in West Hollywood. You cannot really cast anything. So we opened the book having received the cast anxiety’s boomerang back to us but with the smell of doggie cookies.
Well, let us tell you something. Our doubts and anxiety were for naught. This book is something to be read and enjoyed. It has stories about Mr. Copperfield’s love of the magical arts and those steps along his career that made him an international sensation. But even better — as if that would be possible — he shares stories and images of items from his very secret museum. These are the real objects, tricks, costumes and literature collected by someone who appears as fanatical about the history of Magic as he is in performing.
We could take hours extolling the virtues of his book but that would essentially be copying the book with our less than adequate style. We would still end the review with the gentle instruction to buy the book. You could buy it for the images, the history, the care with which it is written, or the peek inside Mr. Copperfield’s warehouse of Magic.
Our recommendation, buy the book. Get your own copy, share if you must but always with the firm instruction that the borrower must return the book promptly and would be better off buying it for him or herself.
A must buy!
Inside Magic Review: Five out of Five!
