Card Tricks: The Royal Road to Card Magic

The Panda Chronicles tells the story of our charming but bewildered hero's attempts to get a paw around the great truths of life and love, even as he sparks off chaos all around. Part low comedy, part post-modern fable, the story proceeds through a series of allegorical encounters with a colourful cast of minor characters, presented to us by an excitable contemporary narrator.

As Panda's slapstick disasters take a more tragic turn, so the text cunningly dismantles itself, and we are left pondering, with Panda and his beleaguered narrator, just what it has all meant. Throw in a lyrical prose style, a dose of romance, war, shipwrecks and the god of tangled coat hangers, and you are ready to enter the unique world of Panda, walking into things, and bumping his snout.