Product Description

Derren Brown's television and stage performances have entranced and dumbfounded millions. His baffling illusions and stunning set pieces - such as "The Seance", "Russian Roulette" and "The Heist" - have set new standards of what's possible, as well as causing more than their fair share of controversy. Now, for the first time, he reveals the secrets behind his craft, what makes him tick and just why he grew that beard. "Tricks of the Mind" takes you on a journey into the structure and pyschology of magic. Derren teaches you how to read clues in people's behaviour and spot liars. He discusses the whys and wherefores of hypnosis and shows how to do it. And he investigates the power of suggestion and how you can massively improve your memory. He also takes a long hard look at the paranormal industry and why some of us feel the need to believe in it in the first place. Alternately hilarious, controversial and challenging, "Tricks of the Mind" is essential reading for Derren's legions of fans, and pretty bloody irresistible even if you don't like him that much...

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #677 in Books
• Published on: 2007-10-08
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 416 pages

From the Back Cover
‘As Europe’s most controversial Ming-bearded mind-botherer and former cha-cha chamption, I offer here an insight into the techniques and thinking which have made me offensively rich and the best thing to happen to television since sliced bread. Improve your memory. Learn how to hypnotize. Read minds. Improve your memory. It’s literally all here.’

Derren Brown's television and stage performances have entranced and dumbfounded millions. His baffling illusions and stunning set pieces – such as The Seance, Russian Roulette and The Heist – have set new standards of what's possible, as well as causing more than their fair share of controversy. Now, for the first time, he reveals the secrets behind his craft, what makes him tick and just why he grew that beard.

Tricks of the Mind takes you on a journey into the structure and psychology of magic. Derren also takes a long hard look at the paranormal industry, and looks at why some of us feel the need to believe in it in the first place...

Alternately hilarious, controversial and challenging, Tricks of the Mind is essential reading for Derren's legions of fans, and pretty bloody irresistible even if you don't like him that much...

‘Clearly the best dinner-party guest in history – he’s either a balls-out con artist or the scariest man in Britain.’
Charlie Brooker Guardian

About the Author
Derren was born in 1971 in Croydon. It was a difficult birth - his mother was in Devon at the time. A precocious and puzzling only child, he liked to paint, foster obsessive habits and once set fire to a neighbour's boat by accident. Derren went on to study Law and German at Bristol University and fell in love with the city. This was a time when marriage between man and city was still frowned upon, so rather than face public derision Derren decided just to live there forever instead. During this time he began to perform magic in bars and restaurants, and gave occasional hypnosis shows. Then in 1999 he was asked by Channel 4 to put a mind-reading programme together for television, which became Derren Brown: Mind Control. Mind Controls 2 and 3 followed and then, in October 2003, Derren caused an international furore by playing Russian Roulette live on television. This secured his notoriety with the public and a big apartment in London. Further specials have followed - Derren Brown: The Seance was the most complained about show in the history of television. He still receives several letters of complaint a week from psychics and Christians. He is sensitive to everyone's objections but knows at least the latter group will forgive him. Derren lives in London with a large collection of taxidermy and a fatalistic parrot.

Customer Reviews

Well, of course he doesn't reveal ALL...
Needless to say, anyone in Derren Brown's profession who wrote a book reavealing everything about how they work wouldn't last very long. What is remarkable about this book is that it actually reveals quite a lot. No, he doesn't explain how each trick works (as if!) but there is plenty here to interest the curious among us.

If you want some tips on hypnotism, which he describes as the product of effective suggestion rather than a unique trance-like state, feats of memory or straightforward conjuring (something I suspect he uses much more of in his routines than he'd like you to think), there is a great deal of information provided. If we read it and practise what it reveals (that's the bit most of us are not prepared to do because it takes for ever), any of us could invent some pretty neat tricks of our own. Insofar as anyone will write a 'how to' guide on hypnotising your friends, this is probably as close as we're going to get.

Some may not like the book's mixture of tips, autobiographical anecdotes and polemic about how easily fooled people are and how they really will believe almost anything. Admittedly, these elements don't always come together all that smoothly, but they do all reveal a lot about the man, his view of the world and what he thinks of the whole school of 'you can fool most of the people a lot of the time' opportunists (hucksters, charlatans, salesmen and camp Northern psychics of every stripe).

The book's structure may be flawed, but its honesty is the ace up its sleeve - not bad in a profession based on fooling people.

Eye-opening and very funny
In which the celebrated TV showman and 'mentalist' reveals (some of) the tricks of his trade, plus a selection of tips and mind hacks that anyone would find useful.

Along the way he gives us a whistle-stop tour of magic, memory techniques (an excellent introduction), hypnosis (with a bit about NLP), unconscious communication and 'cold reading, and pseudo-science and sloppy thinking.

Naturally, being an NLP trainer, it was the bit about NLP I turned to first. Derren attended a large course on which Richard Bandler was one of the trainers (with 'four hundred or so delegates, some of whom were clearly either unbalanced or self-delusory') which he found 'highly evangelical'. He says it was a four-day course so it can't have been Paul McKenna's (unless Derren developed amnesia for some of the days) as this lasts for seven, as far as I know. Nevertheless, he likes NLP enough to include some nifty NLP self-help techniques (subtle mirroring and various submodality interventions including the phobia cure, mapping across and a couple of variations on the swish pattern for motivation and confidence) with step-by-step instructions.

By the way, if you only read one bit of the book, make it the 'Confusion and Self-Defence' section at the end of the hypnosis chapter - not only is it very funny, it could save your life some day.

The underlying attitude running through the book is one of skepticism - particularly about professional psychics and mediums. Given his background - an evangelical Christian in his teens, becoming disillusioned with it as he got into stage hypnotism and magic - it's not surprising that he's a skeptic. Having first-hand experience of how a circular belief system leads to an insistence on one particular interpretation of 'reality' while discounting all others, plus a professional's command of the tools and tricks of mental deception, will do that to you.

The final section of the book, on 'anti-science, pseudo-science, and bad thinking' is excellent - a skewering of alternative medicine, cold-reading tricks used by charlatans, and the 'thinking traps' that seem to be almost hard-wired into our thought processes, leading us to see patterns where there are none in coincidences and making some people a magnet for scamsters.

The writing style is delightful - self-deprecating and very funny. I hadn't actually seen that many of Derren's TV shows (no, I'm not on first-name terms with him, but reading this book will make you feel like he's your mate) but I'm now a confirmed fan.

Buy this book if a) you're interested in the techniques he uses in his stage and TV shows, b) you want to improve your memory and confidence, c) you want to get better at thinking or d) you want a good laugh.

Opens up a little (but not a lot!)

On TV he does come across as a slightly smug character, and some of the sarcastic asides in here just reinforce that opinion. But he is an expert in his field, so I picked this up interested in hearing what he had to say.

And he does open a bit, but you only really get the tip of the iceburg. A couple of card tricks, some lie detection, some basic hypnosis tricks, plus a whole chunk debunking anything in this world that relies on faith basically. Christianity, spirituality - Derren has read the Dawkins book and wants his say too. Now, his views and explanation are interesting, and I did laugh at some of his little comments (for eg, why have braille labels in an aquarium), but I'd rather have had some more solid content about some of the stunts that he does. Having six or seven pages of crank letters is amusing first time through, but I would rather have had the same space with more insight into his act.

It's an easy read though, and he does know his stuff. The NLP section is very interesting. So I'd recommend it.