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If there's a more incredibly thorough or more thoroughly incredible bookout there on the past, present and future of the midway, I don't know it. Blessed are all we rubes that Joe Nickell's Secrets of the Sideshows is outin the world. -- James Taylor, author of James Taylor's Shocked and Amazed: On & Off theMidw An exciting experience of the mostly American phenomenon of carnys, sideshows, freaks, and carnivals. -- UFO Aktuellt Nickell takes us inside the world of fire-eaters, sword-swallowers, jugglers, snake-handlers, and magicians to explain the illusions and oddities we may have puzzled over but never fully understood. -- Robert A. Baker, author of They Call It Hypnosis Simultaneously provides an insider's glimpse of that world on the skirts of the main event and an excursion into a vanishing feature of North American life. -- PsycCritiques The author, lifting up the back flap of the tent show, reveals, informs, and presents a range of human oddities from the 'real' to the 'created.' -- Linking Ring A widely researched and splendidly illustrated history of the bizarre world of the exhibited abnormal and the demonstrated impossible. -- Foreword Magazine Using history, real carny language, stories from former sideshow workers and owners, and from Nickell's own archives, Secrets of the Sideshows is a wealth of information for circus fans or anyone who's wondered how those seemingly-impossible illusions are created. -- Brookings (SD) Register For an entertaining book on a rapidly fading culture that was once a thriving part of old America, be sure and pick up The Secret of the Sideshows. -- Jarrid Deaton, The Floyd County Times To be sure, he gives plenty of secrets away here, most of them open secrets, but the book works best as a tribute to the imagination of the performers and organizers of the exhibits which were meant to provoke and satisfy that admirable old human characteristic, curiosity.... If you want the lowdown on sideshows, step right up, ladies and gentlemen, Joe Nickell presents the best show on the midway. -- Times of Acadiana An enjoyable read.... Nickell has encyclopedic knowledge of sideshow history -- Roanoke (VA) Times Ever since I saw Penn and Teller 'eat' fire and pontificate on the circus sideshow, I have been curious to learn more about it, not only the history and culture of the sideshow, but the secrets themselves! Nickell delivers brilliantly. -- Michael Shermer, author of Why People Believe Weird Things A book that gives you the straight lowdown on the acts and the people behindthem. A clear-eyed look into a vanishing bit of Americana. Intriguing andunique. -- Joe R. Lansdale, Edgar Award winning author of The Bottoms and Freezer Burn To find out how it's done, and other carnival minutiae, browse Nickell's comprehensive Secrets of the Sideshows. -- Entertainment Weekly An illustrated book for large popular-culture collections. Recommended for all levels. -- Choice Nickell offers first a history of sideshows... then presents a comprehensive analysis of sideshow performers, skills, and illusions.... Recommended. -- Choice Using history, real carny language, stories from former sideshow workers and owners, and from Nickell's own archives, Secrets of the Sideshows is a wealth of information for circus fans or anyone who's wondered how those seemingly-impossible illusions are created. -- Algona Upper Desmoines (IA), Brookings (SD) Register, Lake Country (WI), Marco I

For an entertaining book on a rapidly fading culture that was once a thriving part of old America, be sure and pick up The Secret of the Sideshows. -- Jarrid Deaton The Floyd County Times

<p> For an entertaining book on a rapidly fading culture that was once a thriving part of old America, be sure and pick up The Secret of the Sideshows. -- Jarrid Deaton, The Floyd County Times

Author Information

Joe Nickell, Senior Research Fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), is the author of more than twenty investigative books, including Secrets of the Sideshows and Real-Life X-Files: Investigating the Paranormal.

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