Hello there, my name is Tom McCarron, I am 15 years old and I am from Merseyside, England. I am currently writing my book Tom McCarron Close Up. It will contain a whole range of close up magic for the beginner and professional, it contains my own personal inventions, which so far total about 36, and it will also include some lesser known tricks. I am writing it on Microsoft Word and I am going to print it as a physical book and not an e-book. I am writing to ask if anyone in the UK would be interested in buying it later this year, or if you have any ideas where or how I could advertise it (ABRA?). I just want to know if it is worth all this hard work and finger breaking typing. If I find someone adequate here at the Café I will send them an advance copy free of charge and ask them to write a review on the review forum Café.
Yours Magically
Tom McCarron

Hello Tom,

Although I do encourage you to write your book if only for the writing experience you'll get out of it, you have to realize that many would-be buyers will be skeptical about the originality and usefulness of a book written by a 15 years old. Please go on reading, it gets positive later. Books of this type are usually written by adult magicians who have proven themselves in the field, something I suspect you haven't had the time to do just yet.

What I would suggest would be to create a professional looking website with videos and descriptions of the effects you are describing. You could even have an adult to perform them to lend it more credibility. I know you must think it sucks but you simply cannot change the way people think overnight... If your effects are truly original and useful, you will sell your book online. A limited photocopy run could be an economical solution to begin with. Of course, you'd also have to let people know about your site and your book and that is when advertising comes in. Even just mentioning your site and your book on forums like these may attract surfers.

You simply cannot expect people to spend money on a book without them knowing what to expect from it. So go ahead and show us some magic, make a sale pitch and you'll see what happens...

Hope this helps! Good luck!

Richard

Tom, it is always best with magic, particularly when creating, to not mention age.

Firstly, being young, magi will generally be biased into thinking that you are not going to have much originality.

And if you do, you find that they almost use your age against you.

"It's good... For a 15 year old"

So, awkward as it may be, it is my advice that you be sure not to reveal your age in your future works.

Just some thoughts,

Liam.

Liam,

I don't know if that is what you were implying but I never meant to discourage Tom, on the contrary. I rather tried to give him hints as to how he should proceed to stand a chance of succeeding. Would you buy a book you haven't had the chance to hold in your hands from someone you never heard of? I don't think so and nobody could blame you. My suggestion of getting someone older to perform for the video proves your point though: even if he is a genious, being 15 years old will play against him and when you're in front of the camera, it is much harder to hide your age then behind an anonymous post...

Richard

..although folks like Andi Gladwin are an exception to the rule. Tom, why don't you see if you can get in touch with Andi, and get his take on it? He'd be able to give you far better pointers than I can.

Hey Richard, sorry, no offense or implications of any sort. I was merely offering Tom my personal advice on how to avoid exactly the problems that you were alerting him to, and therefore helping him to avoid.

What I was trying to suggest to Tom was that keeping his age discrete would be a good idea, for many of the reasons that you stated.

Also, Andi Gladwin is a very cool magician, but he has never RELIED on his age to sell his stuff.

Unlike someone like Joshua Jay, for example.

Just some thoughts,

Liam.

Thanks guys. Richard just to let you know I am currently in the process of making a page, and videos will be available! Thank you so much for your support and I hope that you will enjoy some of my effects should my book ever come into your hands!

BTW I recently got in touch with Andi Gladwin. Thank you.

I've finished the site take a look http://www.tommccarroncloseup.20fr.com

Being new around here, could someone tell me who is Andi Gladwin?

Richard

Andi Gladwin is a young magician (19) from Britain. He has his own magic dealer along with Andy Leviss look at:

http://www.asquaredproductions.com

He has performed with Lance Burton and is very good.

Sorry if a bit brief!

Tom

Liam,

It's okay! You know how chatting and posting can lead to misinterpretations? Well, I just wanted to be sure I had been understood. No need to apologize on your part, I'm the one who misunderstood, hehe!

Richard

Tom,
Do you have a teacher? If so, what does he think about you writing this book?

Tom,

Congratulations on your achievements!

The question of age seems to be one that is being addressed. I am fifty-eight years old, with over four decades in the entertainment industry, over twenty as a marketing professor whose niche is personality marketing, and it is still not an easy issue to resolve. So, instead I will tell you what I did in the entertainment business and how it worked out.

Before going to college, I had four years of professional stage experience as an entertainer. Most of it was working with recording artists. My natural contacts were well disbursed throughout the recording, broadcast, acting and entertainment industries. As a college student, I could not travel as is required of a recording artists to make the significant money. Therefore, I resigned myself to becoming the unknown businessman behind the known entertainers and spent what time I could in the recording studios.

I started a company (American Artists Enterprises) with an office in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, where I was in college, and New York, which at that time (1963) enjoyed significantly more power in the entertainment industry than it does today. With that setup, I had access to the recording, broadcast, publishing, commercial production, and theater industries. At that time Alabama and Tennessee probably accounted for nearly 60% of all the music recording business in the world and, my estimate is that 80% of all profitable music recording revenues were controlled from within 300-400 miles of Tuscaloosa. (My original plan was to move it all to central Florida later. Walt Disney got there first.) My product offerings were booking contracts, recording contracts, and personal artist management. Within a year I recognized an untapped market to provide entertainment for shopping centers and malls. That business developed very quickly. There were 542 shopping centers and malls that did business with me.

Now let’s talk about age. I was barely 18 when I started the business. Frankly, negotiating for recording contracts was the easiest and negotiating booking contacts was the hardest once I started dealing with merchants’ associations. They simply believed that if I were that young, I could not deliver. A kind older man in Mississippi asked me if I would be willing to try an experiment. That meant taking my name off the business cards and letterheads. That was not an easy thing for a proud young man to do. But I did it. My new business cards said Bob Sanders, Representative. And the letterheads only named the corporation.

Within three months, the older talent buyers went out of their way to help the struggling young “representative” keep his job and go to school. I did not claim to be the boss. The bookings came from everywhere. For years, every time Billboard published the top 40s at least a dozen of the artists were connected with my company. The merchants’ associations became gravy. Talent buyers were not ready to recognize a person that young in charge. The facts never changed. I started it and I owned it. I was dealing with people intimidated with negotiating with the boss. They talked very freely with the “Representative”. Then we could solve our problems together. For years I saved a personal letter from Rod Sterling expressing his surprise in learning who owned the business. He wanted to publish a magazine called American Artists.

Did it work? Who knows what would have happened the other way? Later, I left the music business entirely for just magic. It was good, it is good, and I look forward to things remaining good. My kids have trust funds, Lucy and I still perform magic and lecture, and I still hear the old hits on the radio, television and in commercials. Shopping centers and malls are on the way out. Most of those early people are dead and gone. But I have kept a business card that says Bob Sanders, Representative. Some days, I need it.

Good Luck!

Bob