Pick me a trick

How Flick picks a trick

Flick asks four questions, and every answer is one of three big boxes, so there is nothing to type. Then Flick looks along all 80 tricks in the shop and hands over one, with the reason in a sentence: what you have, how long you have got, and why this trick suits it.

1. First, how old are you? 5 or 6 · 7, 8 or 9 · 10, 11 or 12 (skipped when Peabody already knows your grade)
2. What's on the table in front of you? Nothing at all · Pencil, paper, cards or coins · Cup, spoon or kitchen things
3. How long have you got to learn it? Right now · Ten minutes · A few days
4. Who's going to watch? Just me · One person · A whole room

That makes 81 different ways through the questions, and every one of them ends on a real trick. The rules are the shop's own. A trick only comes up if you have what it needs on the table, and that never bends: a coin trick needs a coin. Your age decides which tricks fit, the same way the shop sorts its shelves. "Right now" means a trick that works the first try, "ten minutes" adds the ones with a bit of setting up, and "a few days" brings in the real secret moves. A trick that needs a helper is only picked when somebody is going to watch, and for a whole room Flick prefers a mind-reading trick everybody can play along with.

When nothing fits exactly, Flick bends one thing at a time and says which: a trick that takes a little longer than you said, then one that needs a helper, and last of all one that is a stretch for your age, which Flick says to do with a grown-up beside you. A trick you have already performed for somebody is skipped while there is another that fits, so the next pick is always new. Tap "Another one" and Flick walks on to the next trick without asking again.

Nothing you tap is sent anywhere or kept. The only thing the picker reads from this device is the Magic Shop's own record: the tricks you have performed, and the props you said you have, which lights up the matching box. Print Tonight's trick and you get the trick on one sheet: what you need, how it starts, the words to say, a code that opens the full trick, and a line to fill in when you have shown it to somebody.

Would rather look for yourself? Every trick is on the shop's shelves, and the ways in below sort them by age, by how hard they are and by what kind of magic they are. Grown-ups will find the safety rules and the classroom notes on the page for parents and teachers.