Preview · Page 1 of 2
Meet the Book
This is the book’s own stage: Harry Houdini — from his own photograph — stands on the stage, while his own life and his own secrets are read aloud in English, in Ryan’s voice: the pitch-book he sold in theater lobbies, the methods of the manacle kings, and his classic exposé of the fire-eaters, sword-swallowers, and strongmen. The bookstore barcode rides every frame — scan any moment to come back to this bookstore.
Press Next to see everything that is inside the whole book.
Preview · Page 2 of 2
What’s Inside
- The Escape King, whole: The Adventurous Life of a Versatile Artist (1922), in three parts; Handcuff Secrets and How to Do Them (1909), preface and fifteen chapters; Miracle Mongers and Their Methods (1920), preface and twelve chapters.
- 6 hours 19 minutes of narration — Ryan reads the book aloud in English, page by page, in a reading room you can follow with your eyes, while Houdini’s portrait stands on the stage.
- Three books, one stage — the life, the handcuff methods, and the miracle mongers’ methods, exactly as he printed them.
- The barcode rides every stage frame — scan any moment to come back to this bookstore.
These are the public-domain texts of Harry Houdini’s The Adventurous Life of a Versatile Artist (1922 edition), Handcuff Secrets and How to Do Them (1909), and Miracle Mongers and Their Methods (1920), presented as a talking hologram book in the author’s own words. Every copy opens with an honest disclaimer that names its sources and labels the one piece of showmanship in them: the pitch-book’s Appleton, Wisconsin birthplace was Houdini’s own billing — the record says he was born Erik Weisz in Budapest in 1874. The label says so, up front. Houdini died on 31 October 1926 — a full century ago. The narration is a synthesized English reading (Piper — Ryan) of these texts, made for this edition. Editor: Franklin Langston.
franklinlangston.gumroad.com/l/gwdszr
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