Look at this amazing Order of Odd-Fish art by Isa—that is, Bellaboutime on Instagram! I’m awed by Isa’s depiction of the All-Devouring Mother’s multifarious and terrifying eyes, its multiple slavering mouths, and the fascinating way it unravels and collapses. Every inch of the monster-goddess is packed with beautifully gruesome detail (I love the bits of gristle hurtling out of its maw!). And the way Ian and his ostrich are silhouetted against the smoldering red sky is epic. Gorgeous and impressive!

Wait, why am I posting Order of Odd-Fish fan art? Well, one reason is because I started an Instagram of the many pieces of Odd-Fish fan art that I’ve received over the years. Another reason? Matt Bird and I recorded a brand-new episode of our Secrets of Story podcast . . . and it’s all about Odd-Fish!

Matt and I have been debating storytelling techniques for years, both in real life and on his Secrets of Story blog (which led to his useful, successful, and highly recommended Secrets of Story book).

There are two other great episodes that Matt and I recorded with writer Lou Anders, but I haven’t officially posted about them on this blog yet. But I’ll get around to them soon! But I wanted to post about this episode while it’s still fresh.

On his blog, Matt has been advancing his theory that to suck us into a story, the writer needs to make the reader Believe, Care, and Invest. That is, the reader must be made to Believe in the world of the book (usually through some oddly specific details), Care for the hero’s situation (often because the hero suffers some unmerited or disproportionate insult or injury), and Invest in the hero (by demonstrating that the hero has it in them to solve the problems of this story).

Matt annotated the first chapter of Odd-Fish in this post on his blog, and did a Believe-Care-Invest test in this other post on his blog. Both of his posts are worth reading if you’re curious to see the nuts-and-bolts of how the first chapter of Odd-Fish works!

And if you’re interested in how Odd-Fish holds up against Matt’s storytelling best-practices advice, here’s the episode of the podcast:

In the episode, I mentioned the fan art gallery show / costumed dance party we did for Odd-Fish way back in the day. It was a wild night, the costumes were glamorous, the dance-fights were spectacular, the art was top-notch! Lurid pictures, shocking video, and the total low-down on that party can be found here.

Also in the episode, Matt and I refer to a chart that interrelates the nine major characters of Odd-Fish‘s ensemble. You can see it below! Our hero Jo is in the middle, and you can see how she is related to each supporting character by how they bring out a certain aspect of Jo through being a negation of some aspect of her character (for instance, Jo has a plain style and doesn’t want to be notorious or in the spotlight; the opposite of Sefino, who has a foppish style and craves notoriety and the spotlight). And those supporting characters are related to each other as negations of similars: for instance, Sefino is a silly dandy while Ken Kiang is a dangerous dandy. I didn’t start writing Odd-Fish with a chart like this in hand, but a chart like this was being built throughout the writing of the book, and it helped to sharpen and distinguish the different characters.

Click the chart for a larger, easier-to-read version:

Matt and I also talked about whether Odd-Fish polarizes characters into Head, Heart, and Gut, as many stories do, an interesting phenomenon we discuss in Episode 23. That kind of polarization does kind of work for Odd-Fish, but not as tightly as I expected it would. So I thought about it, and I realized that Odd-Fish has its own character archetypes . . . and maybe the challenge for every author is to figure out our own archetypes that are natural for us to write, and not just mechanically repeat archetypes that we see elsewhere. Anyway, here are the bespoke archetypes I figured out for Odd-Fish:

All right, that’s enough about The Order of Odd-Fish for now! After all, I’ve got that brand new book coming out in September!

It’s another episode of the Secrets of Story podcast I do with Matt Bird! He’s my friend who has set himself as a storytelling guru, and is the author of a book and blog with the same name as the podcast. Matt usually gives storytelling advice, and I give pushback. We don’t always agree!

Every once in a while we switch roles, and I bring in my own crackpot storytelling theories. My latest hot take: novelists and screenwriters can learn a lot from cult leaders and the techniques of brainwashing!

Wait, don’t go! It’s not as weird as it sounds. After all, both cult leaders and storytellers are trying to do something similar: recruit an audience, suck them into their little world, and keep the audience there. Cults seem to be pretty successful, especially nowadays, so why not harness their dark arts of brainwashing to write better stories! As a bonus, over the course of the episode Matt and I recover repressed memories about our own experiences with cults.

I’m really proud of this episode! I think that in the back-and-forth of our discussion, Matt and I hit upon some truths about storytelling that I haven’t heard expressed before. That said, I actually got the idea for this episode from watching this video essay about one of my favorite recent movies, Midsommar. The video essay is called “How Midsommar Brainwashes You” by a YouTuber called “Acolytes of Horror,” and I recommend it if you’ve seen Midsommar and love it as much as I do:

In this episode I put forth a system of the 14 Steps Of Brainwashing, which is adapted from various sources including Robert Jay Lifton, who studied brainwashing in the 1950s, but with a few additions of my own. My contention is that not only does the hero of many stories go through these steps—it’s kind of like an alternate version of the Hero’s Journey—but these are also the very steps that the storyteller uses to lure, trap, and keep an audience. I’m only listing the steps here for reference; if you want to hear my explanation of how the steps relate to storytelling, listen to the episode. It’s a goodie!

Recruit the target
1. Find a vulnerable target
2. Invite the target to an innocuous event

Break down the target’s identity/self
3. Cut the target off from outside influences
4. “Lovebomb” the target; dangle the Prize in front of the target
5. Extract an agreement from the target that they want the prize

Exhaust the target with stress
6. Shut down dissent by threatening to withhold the prize, iterating between carrot and stick
7. Arouse guilt in target and lead them to self-betrayal
8. Bring the target to a breaking point
9. Offer leniency and clear steps to make things right: compulsion of confession, channeling of guilt, action to be done

Worship together / full communion
10. Release of guilt through ritual or signficicant act
11. Progress and harmony
12. Final confession and rebirth into new community and identity

Matt also posts about this episode in on his blog.

And now, since we’re talking about cults anyway, this gives me an opportunity to post one of my favorite skits from the old Ben Stiller show, a parody of Lassie, but instead of the family having a dog, they have a Charles Manson, played by the legend Bob Odenkirk:

It’s hard to believe, but this is the TENTH YEAR of our 90-Second Newbery Film Festival!

It’s an annual video contest I founded in which kid filmmakers create short movies that tell the entire stories of Newbery-winning books in about ninety seconds. Every year we put on big live screenings at libraries and theaters in fourteen cities around the country. We can’t do in-person screenings this year, obviously, but you can click on these links to see the virtual screenings we did this year for New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Tacoma, Boulder, and Assorted Cities.

This year, I decided also to put on a special virtual screening for twelve of the best 90-Second Newbery movies we received for 2021. It was very difficult to pick just twelve. You can watch it above!

The screening is hosted by me and Keir Graff (author of The Tiny Mansion and many other great kids’ books). In it, we share the best 2021 90-Second Newbery videos from all over the country—created by young filmmakers from New York to Washington, from Wisconsin to Texas, and Oklahoma, Utah, Tennessee, and Illinois!

The show opens with a brief skit that investigates the MYSTERIOUS FATES of previous participants in the 90-Second Newbery over the past ten years. And of course there is a ludicrous and embarrassing musical number. (Special thanks to guest star Freya Trefonides, who played Meg Murry in the A Wrinkle in Time movie that was the very first 90-Second Newbery ten years ago. Here’s a post I did about her way back in 2009! And while you’re at it, go ahead and buy some of her cool art here.)

Want to learn more about the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival? Visit our official website at www.90secondnewbery.com. The deadline for submitting movies for next year is January 14, 2022.

Thank you to all the young filmmakers for their fantastic movies. Thanks also to the families, teachers, and librarians who assisted them! So sit back, relax, and enjoy the video above.

Here’s the program order:

1. My Father’s Dragon (Ruth Gannett, 1949 Honor Book) by Lily Manning, Chicago, IL

2. The Westing Game (Ellen Raskin, 1979 Medal Winner) by the 11th and 12th Grade Language Arts Class of the Compass Homeschool Initiative, Tulsa, OK

3. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White, 1953 Honor Book) by Galileo Elizarraraz of the Advanced Learning Academy, San Antonio, TX

4. Bridge to Terabithia (Katherine Paterson, 1978 Medal Winner) by Mary, Brynlee, Everett, Zane, and Audrey of Orem Elementary, Orem, UT

5. Millions of Cats (Wanda Gag, 1929 Honor Book) by Eian-Gabriel Sinclair, Rochester, NY

6. Hatchet (Gary Paulsen, 1988 Honor Book) by Stella Barry of Summit Trail Middle School, Maple Valley, WA

7. Hatchet (Gary Paulsen, 1988 Honor Book) by Allie Said of Gladeville Middle School, Mt. Juliet, TN

8. The Dark Frigate (Charles Hawes, 1924 Medal Winner) by Jillian Parrino, Albertson, NY

9. Lincoln: A Photobiography (Russell Freedman, 1988 Medal Winner) by Juarez Elizarraraz of the Advanced Learning Academy, San Antonio TX

10. The Giver (Lois Lowry, 1994 Medal Winner) by Maya Schneider, Green Bay, WI

11. New Kid (Jerry Craft, 2020 Medal Winner) by Cedric Ranon and Ethan Machaya of Lincoln Hall Middle School, Lincolnwood, IL

12. A Wrinkle in Time (Madeleine L’Engle, 1963 Medal Winner) by Riley Levine, Highland Park, IL

Thanks so much for your movies! I hope you make movies for next year, too.

P.S. Do you want to support the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival, so we can keep this crazy show going every year, coast to coast? Please make a tax-deductible donation to the 90-Second Newbery here so we can keep bringing this program to everyone across the country for yet another ten years! The 90-Second Newbery is under the nonprofit fiscal sponsorship of Fractured Atlas.