On a bitter January day, three men are found to be missing from one of the highest security prisons in the UK, a prison with a reputation as the ‘British Alcatraz’. With seemingly no tools or materials, they have somehow managed to scale two huge perimeter walls. And stranger still is the fact that the men responsible haven’t actually ‘broken out’ of this prison at all. The men responsible have let themselves out, using a key. But with no keys stolen and none of the locks showing any signs of having been picked, how could this be possible? In this week’s episode, Barry and Lora explore the 1995 HMP Parkhurst breakout.

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In 1988, a Florida housewife makes an utterly astonishing claim. She says that, on a regular basis, large golden patches spontaneously form across the whole of her body, as though she is literally sweating gold. And that is not even the limit of her powers. This same woman is also a talented psychic, who has worked with the police. Moreover, she can make precious objects fall from her eyes and ears, as though they have been conjured. But is she really a gifted psychic, possessing some of the most extraordinary paranormal skills ever recorded? Or might there have been a more magical method behind the remarkable phenomena?

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Join Lora and Barry for a very special episode of The Magician’s Wife, to celebrate the launch of Lora’s debut novel The Woman in the Wallpaper. For today’s trick, we invite you to party like it’s 1793. But listen carefully… is everything really what it seems?

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In 1793, a young woman meets her end in the jaws of the guillotine. But when her severed head is held up to the crowd, her expression is clearly seen to change by multiple witnesses, as though she is still conscious. Similar accounts follow, of freshly-severed heads blinking and winking, blushing and moving their lips, until there are so many witnesses to this gruesome phenomena, they can’t all be mistaken. But surely they must be, as a head remaining conscious after it has been decapitated sounds far too much like a magic trick. Doesn’t it? In this episode of The Magician’s Wife, Barry and Lora investigate the grisly topic of ‘lucid decapitation’.

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In 18th century Prussia, a man giving off the foulest stench imaginable is found wandering the streets eating anything he can get his hands on. When he is arrested by the authorities, he claims he is a French spy, carrying top secret documents inside a wooden box that he has swallowed. After waiting for nature to take its course, the authorities realise that the strange man is indeed telling the truth. Little do they know the extent of his extraordinary eating habits, from cutlery to rocks, to a much more sinister menu than anyone could have imagined. But who was this outlandish individual and, more importantly, what was causing his behaviour? Join Barry and Lora as they explore the life of the French showman and criminal Tarrare.

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A quick update from Barry and Lora... about how the art of deception might be considered too deceptive. If you've enjoyed this show over the past few months, we'd be ever so grateful if you'd take a minute to leave us a nice review. Thank you so much!

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In the summer of 1986, whilst getting ready for work, a mother suddenly collapses and dies in the bathroom of her home. The headache tablets she took that morning are examined and found to be contaminated with lethal doses of cyanide. Soon, not only have more contaminated bottles been found, but a woman has come forward claiming her husband may have also died from swallowing the same deadly headache pills. Has a pharmaceutical company really manufactured a killer batch of tablets, or is there a little more to this story than meets the eye? 

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Pour yourself a wee dram and join Barry and Lora for this special Burns Night episode, which investigates the infamous Scottish export the haggis, exploring the bizarre and legendary creature that is said to dwell north of the border. But could there be any truth behind the strange little snuffling creature native only to Bonnie Scotland? Plus, Barry makes his magical predictions about events yet to happen in 2025!

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On the morning of 30th December, 1978, a series of shocking scenes are discovered at a respectable Colorado home. Two teenagers have been shot in their beds, one of them after a bloody struggle. Their 45 year-old mother is dead, too. She is found in the basement, slumped over her typewriter, having typed up a suicide note. This note, together with a host of other factors, reinforces the belief that the woman shot her own children before turning the gun on herself. But is there more to the story than meets the eye? In this episode Barry and Lora try to work out whether there is a psychopath in the family, sharing a simple psychopath test you can carry out at home.

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In the early part of the 18th century, a bloody and bizarre sequence of events unfolds at a country house in the north-east of England. It all begins when a stranger leaves an innocuous parcel of linens with the servants of the house. But just hours later and the scene is a bloodbath, and the servants quickly realise that the innocent-looking parcel of linens isn’t quite so innocent as it had seemed. In this episode, Barry and Lora investigate the surprising story of the bizarre ‘Lang Pack’.

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