Séance for Skeptics
How to Talk to the Dead

Since the earliest days of the Skeptics Society my friend and colleague Mark Edward has been consulting us on how to explain psychics and mediums to the media and public. Mark should know; although he is not a psychic, he plays one on TV, and at the Magic Castle in Hollywood, and even at Caltech for the Skeptics Society. It was Mark who first explained to me the methods of cold reading employed by psychics and mediums, and he was our resident psychic for the Fox Family Channel television series, Exploring the Unknown, on which he appeared several times, including conducting a séance (which he also once did at Caltech, on the occasion of the anniversary of Houdini’s death, in which the great magician appeared to make an appearance at that august institute of science). Now Mark is making available to non-magicians his book Sense and Séance, which I highly recommend. The information on the book follows… —Michael Shermer