"The Long and the Short of It" by Mark Lewis
Suggested Retail USD$25.00
Available from your favorite dealer
In a Blink: 10 Out of 10

"The Long and The Short of It", a manuscript by Mark Lewis, touts itself as the "The Best Svengali Routine In Existence"; if not, it's certainly damn close. Make no mistake, this is one book anyone who uses a Svengali Deck needs to own. More, it's enough to make you go digging through your sock drawer, finding that sucker and start using it all over again.

The Svengali Deck always gets short-shrift by the more elite among us who rely on the common complaint that it's "over-exposed". I should know; I was one of Those Types (Barrie Richardson and a Florida pitchman changed my mind forever). But the truth of the matter is that the Svengali Deck still is effective magic when done right.

That's what "The Long and the Short of It" does: it teaches a variety of techniques for handling the deck, plus some great effects with it, that produces effective, quality magic. The material here goes way beyond the usual "Kabillion-and-Sixteen Things To Do" pamphlets and into stuff that pitchmen created to do one thing: impress people. What you'll find on the pages are some common things, surely, but it's the uncommon things, the rarer handlings, that make this manuscript a keeper.

Using these techniques as a foundation, Lewis created a routine that is a fine piece of magic. I won't go into detail here because, honestly, there's no way of capturing the routining by listing everything that happens; you'd miss the power that comes from the various slick handlings Lewis teaches. However, it's what you'd expect from a Svengali routine, with a chosen card getting found and lost and found all over the place. But it's the finer points that make this routine something else.

And Lewis goes into detail with it all. That's one thing that first impressed me with "The Long and the Short of It"; Lewis didn't hold anything back here. From the first pages, where Lewis explains the origins of the moves (and credits them everywhere he possibly can), to the last where Lewis makes some fine suggestions for additional tricks to work into the routine, everything gets tipped here (including some great personal asides and anecdotes that make for great reading). The moves, the routine, the psychology... it's all covered.

The sum total of things is that if you use the Svengali Deck, even just every once in a while when you're feeling lazy and multi-phase laser/second-deal routines just seem like a tad too much work, you'll enjoy and benefit from "The Long and the Short of It". If you need impetus to blow the dust off that old deck, break it out, and entertain with it, this manuscript has all you need to break open the box in the basement. If you hate the Svengali Deck and everything it represents, then leave this one alone; there are enough of us out there who know how neat a Svengali Deck can be for spectators who allegedly know all about it.

So I said all of that to say this: "The Long and the Short of It", to paraphrase the cover copy, is "The Best Svengali Manuscript in Existence".

"The Long and the Short of It" by Mark Lewis
In A Blink: 10 Out of 10

Material: 10
Everything you need to know about handling a Svengali Deck. End of story. While the tricks themselves are good, if expected with a Svengali, the moves are something else. There are some mind-blowing pieces in here that are rare to see described, let alone performed. Great, great stuff for Svengali users.

Quality: 10
Lewis' writing style is very clear, but he's also managed to make this an enjoyable read with personal anecdotes, bits of forgotten history, and more than a few personal insights that make this a rarity: it's a page-turner of a magic book.

Illustrations: 10
The book is populated with a number of drawings, all of which are are very well done and serve the text perfectly.

Presentation: 10
The basic presentation is what you expect from a Svengali pitch book. What sets this apart is the structure of the routine itself that soaks the spectators in quick, powerful, surprising, and ultimately entertaining, magic.

Shane