Fooling Houdini, Alex Stone
Fooling Houdini, Alex Stone
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Fooling Houdini
Magicians, Mentalists, Math Geeks, and the Hidden Powers of the Mind

Author: Alex Stone

Narrator: Alex Stone

Unabridged: 9 hr 14 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Harper

Published: 06/19/2012

Synopsis

From the back rooms of New York City’s age-old magic societies to cutting-edge psychology labs, three-card monte games on Canal Street to glossy Las Vegas casinos, Fooling Houdini recounts Alex Stone’s quest to join the ranks of master magicians. As he navigates this quirky and occasionally hilarious subculture populated by brilliant eccentrics, Stone pulls back the curtain on a community shrouded in secrecy, fueled by obsession and brilliance, and organized around one overriding need: to prove one’s worth by deceiving others. But his journey is more than a tale of tricks, gigs, and geeks. By investing some of the lesser-known corners of psychology, neuroscience, physics, history, and even crime, all through the lens of trickery and illusion, Fooling Houdini arrives at a host of startling revelations about how the mind works--and why, sometimes, it doesn’t.

About Alex Stone

Alex Stone has written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Discover, Harper's, and The New Republic. He lives in New York City.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Mara on November 02, 2014

The fact that this book was written without a single allusion to everyone's favorite illusionist, Gob Bluth, is basically a crime against humanity (or at least against the laws of pop culture reference-dom). This missed opportunity is especially egregious, given that our author/magician, Alex St......more

Goodreads review by David on March 12, 2013

What entertainment! This is the autobiographical story of a graduate student in physics, who decided to take a detour into magic. Alex Stone starts the book with a giant flub; he competed in the "Magic Olympics" in Stockholm--and was disqualified because he hid his hands behind a table. That was, fo......more

Goodreads review by Vonia on October 18, 2017

This book is the perfect companion to one of my favorites, "Sleights Of Mind". Whereas "Sleights Of Mind" is written by neuroscientists exploring the world of magic, this is written by a magician exploring magic's significant relevancy to psychology and the neurosciences. (He is, however, also a phy......more

Goodreads review by Javier on October 13, 2022

Un libro curioso que se lee fácilmente. Que nadie espere que sea una recopilación de trucos de magia explicados, no es eso, aunque se dan pistas de cómo funcionan algunos de ellos. Se trata más bien de un recorrido por la magia, por sus diferentes formas (la magia de cerca, el mentalismo, los tahúre......more

Goodreads review by Tori on March 10, 2013

I LOVED this book!!!!!! I loved the author's self-deprecating humor, his anecdotes, and his nerdiness. I loved the subject matter. What a great read!!!!! Stone was a physics guy- working on a PhD at Columbia - and thought that magic would make him less nerdy. He learns, buys, and creates magic tricks,......more

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