Thoth's 27 Messengers by Craig Browning

Thoth's 27 messengers

So full disclosure, while I find no fault with the author from a technical stand point I do feel strongly about him as a person. So my review may be harsher than it needs to be. If not for the supplier I trust, the booklet, and the mention of Philmon Vanderbeck being the inspiration I would not have purchased this item.

So lets get right down to it, this is a reading method jazzed up with 21 card trick. And it is good. But it was good the first time I read it in the supplemental OORT. More on that in a second. There is also some fascinating history about the 21 card trick, from the introduction of 7*7*7. In fact pages 6 - 18 (more than half the actual content) seems to be entirely from other works. The details of the actual method matches my supplemental OORT word for word. The difference is one of formatting. The issue I have is I was promised a work based on an idea of Philmons not an exact copy of his work.

As for the actual works of the effect, theres a small fib on the ad copy for that as well. It says it uses just the major arcana but in actuality you also need 4 aces and a blank card. (I've never had a tarot deck that came with a blank card so their existence was news to me) So its a 27 card trick. One of the things I'd liked to have seen included is a way to scale it down. Its a math trick and should be work able with any multiples of three.

As for the bits of this tome not penned by others we have most of that space filled with a sample reading. Which I found to be well worth the page space. There's also a bit on what to do if the wrong card comes up or if a dark card is the one picked.

There is also one page devoted to the booklet. The booklet is a great idea in theory, but what you're given needs a lot of work before it looks professional enough to hand out to people paying for your services.

I'm not unhappy with my purchase, I've paid more for less. In the end I feel that you're better off spending a few bucks more on The supplemental OORT which has the exact method plus so much more.

If you found this review helpful or thought it sucked let me know in the comments.

Edit to add, I've been informed that the reason it has to be 27 and not something smaller like 12 or 9 is because that is the amount that will let you spell out any name.

Daemon Tarot Review

So I was in the Bsarnes and Noble and I saw the Daemon Tarot, which is an excessively misleading name. For while it and tarot are both decks of cards there the similarity ends. So instead of being the tarot with demon pictures and symbololgy added it is instead a deck of cards depicting daemons from a very old book called The Infernal Dictionary. It comes with a book that is sparse on info but does offer some interesting information on all things depicted and offers an interesting spread. The real question is how were the cards, well keep in mind that this is just my opinion of one deck, but they sucked. Forgetting the fact that you can expect playing card quality from a tarot deck. The cards I revived seem to be from different production run. Half the cards are shorter than the other half. Which can has it uses. But still not happy about it also I don't think they match in tone like I think half of them are subtly lighter. Also my biggest issue is the printing on each card what is basically the text you would find in the book on that card. To be honest if the cards did not have the text under the images I think they still would have had potential. And it still probably good from a reading stand point, the few reading I did with it went well. But it just going to be gathering dust now.

Cathy Shadow's Doing It For Real review.

Cathy Shadow's Doing It For Real, it's from Paul Voodini but while he may have wrote it down it's content is from another. Cathy Shadow is the pseudonym of a reader Voodini met a psychic fair. Which is important, as once you read the thing you may be tempted to balk at your purchase, but these are techniques used by a real worker as convencer of genuine power. She's someone with no magic or mentalism background and as such these demonstrations lack what some would call "the works" most of it boils down to real intuition. Which Voodini has long claimed a belief in. So if you're looking for the next big magic trick you won't find it here. While these pieces can definitely be use as part of a larger routine, I also like the suggestion that doing  these causally will help you better understand the thoughts, feelings, and emotions experienced by someone who is actually psychic. And remember that a fail now and then can make you seem more legit and you can always follow up with a sure fire hit.

3 coins 4 your thoughts by Paul Voodini review.

"3 coins 4 your thoughts" is a methodology for giving readings. The book is a little lite on general reading info but there are other sources for that. Most of the pages are taken up with the system. A simple system that use 3 coins and 4 phase. One of the things I saw mentioned most often about this work was the versatility and the robustness of it. And I found that to be true, you could give full length readings with this or pare it down for something supper quick, or use it with other systems. And it's not complicated at all, one read through and you should be ready to give it a go. Personally I'm going to drop the last phase, it's just not right for what I do reading wise. I take a bit of a hard line against future telling. But I could see a change I can make and probably use the makes a wish thing as my final phase. It's a good system for impromptu readings and probably easier than palm reading. Voodini writes in a strait forward no-nonsense sort of fashion, that I can appreciate.

Now I do have one complaint and this comes more from my magic performer side than anything. The coins used matter, in that the spectator needs to easily see a difference in value between them. Meaning you really need to use current coins of the realm. Which means that you can't carry around some aged foreign coins that you got from an elderly gypsy. I generally don't carry cash money around with me with the exception of the coins I use for magic. And those aren't really useful for this system. Of course it's not a problem if the one receiving the reading has coins on them. Though if there were a debate about coins kept just to do a reading versus the one the spec has, I'd go for the specially kept side. I don't think that change really spends enough time with one person to take up some of their energies. All in all I find it hard to slam a good metaphysical edge on this presentations but I supposed that if your sitter needs that sort of edge you can always go with palm reading.