Hello folks and welcome to our newest newsletter feature, the monthly article called ‘Ex Libris’ (Eh-cks LEE-breese), meaning ‘From the Book’. Generally you will see this term used on bookplates to denote that it came from the library of its owner, ‘From the library of John Russell’.
My aim with this article is to encourage members to read more magic books and magazines, not only for the effects and secrets but for the other bits of information in them such as performance theory, blocking, scripting, etc.
Each month I will feature one book – it may be a book from our club library and it may not, and from that one book I will pick an effect and attempt to analyze various aspects of it. Your job, dear reader, is to study that effect and perhaps even practice and perform it if you like it. Not every effect will suit every person or style, but hopefully it will encourage you to read more magic books! The first feature will appear in the May 2015 newsletter.
I now have a selection of books on hand from Marvin Mathena and I have them all cataloged. I will be attempting to recover any and all missing books in the library in the coming months.
The process for checking out a book will be as follows: Members may contact me via telephone or via e-mail and let me know which book(s) they would like to check out. I will make sure the book get to the next monthly meeting along with the sign-out sheet. I will have the name of the book(s) that are being checked out and the member will sign for each one. We ask that you return them to the library on or before the monthly meeting for the following month (for example: If you check out a book at the May meeting, it should be returned on or before the June meeting). If need be, you can keep the book again if nobody else has requested it and you must sign for it again.
Have a magic month folks and we will see you all soon!
Joaquin Ayala, PhD.
Club Librarian
