Tricks of the Mind | Paperback

Derren Brown manages to rouse the audience in again with this very light-hearted approach to mind altering, and tricking. Almost written like an autobiography, Tricks Of The Mind really delves into Brown's upbringing and what persuaded him to become an illusionist (coupled with hypnotist, and magician). It's full of crazy, and funny anecdotes of his childhood, and explains just how wrong a trick can go if you're not careful.

The book is packed with guides on how to hypnotise people, play tricks with their minds, and generally, how to amaze them at a party, when you're entertaining. He'll go through with you carefully, actually telling you what you're going to experience, as well as seemingly doing it at the same time. You'll almost feel like you're in the room with him as he's written it as more of a conversation with the reader than anything else.

You'll learn different styles of mind manipulation, as well as where they originated, and how he integrates them into his shows. He'll explain in full detail just how he does what he does, and he's not shy to explain what happens when it goes bad. If you're a fan of Derren Brown, this book is definately something for you. It's packed with lots of interesting facts and information and is an excellent read to sit down to on a nice warm day, and relax to. It's split into nicely separated chapters, allowing you to stop every now and again when you reach another concept in the book.

This book is a wonderfull insight to the world of Derren Brown you are give tricks to do and ways to expand on them to make them even better.

I would reccomend this book for anyone who has even just saw one of Derren Browns shows and enjoyed it.

Allthough I do warn you if you do struggle reading or your knowledge of the dictionary is not great you might struggle a bit by the way Derren writes

Not sure where to start with this book, as it has been stated, the book is by no means a fully comprehensive work on the exact sciences and techniques regarding hypnosis or "suggestion", Although this is not necessarily a bad thing, the main subject of the book is, as Derren explains, "a journey into the structure and psycology of magic". It gives readers exactly that. A few chapters of the book are about memory, Derren explains and gives guidelines for methods which will help readers remember things, such a a list of 25 random words, having only studied them for a minute or two, I found this area especially useful for my current A level exams, although it has to be said the reader must have a certain mentality to enjoy and learn from this book. Definately a good book for anyone wanting to dabble in the arts of magic or hypnosis, although further reading would be required, Brown makes an effective introduction to this field, Overall, a good buy, even for people, such as myself, who aren't particular Derren Brown fans.

Although this book is by no means a complete handbook to Derren's performances, it is an overview of the different techniques and skills he uses during his shows. I don't think you should read this book if you want to learn hypnosis, NLP or reading people. He explains the basics of the different techniques, giving you something to practice with. Being only one book, the depth in which each of these subjects can be explained is too low, although the section on memory-improvement is quite adequate. Fortunately at the end of the book a bibliography is included, which has quite a few suggestions if you want to learn more on a specific subject.

The strength of this book lies in the way Derren talks the reader through the subject-matter. The text is aimed directly at the speaker and tells in a very anecdotal manner, so you attention is continuously grabbed and you're able to read through the entire book quite swiftly. The feeling I get when watching his shows on TV is transmitted quite well through this book, while giving you the extra feeling of Derren letting you in on it. After finishing this book you'll end up with the feeling you and Derren are conspiring together in deceiving the world.

Summing it up: this book is a good read. It's funny, playful, honest and a good basis to finding out if you're curious enough to learn more on the mentioned skills. And you'll be reminded why you like Derren in the first place.

The only time I have seen Derren was on his tv show, so I bought this book on the strength of those shows (mind trick played I think). After reading half of the book it's very enjoyable, entertaining to the point of it not being condescending to the reader and you want to learn more on how the mind works in a strange way. I would recommend it to anyone who has a spark of interest in this line of thinking.