The Power of The “Narrative How”
/Last Thursday I wrote.
Next week, I’ll talk about why you might want to use [unbelievable premises]. The “why” I’m going to share has been eye-opening for the people I’ve discussed it with, and I think it offers a fresh way to think about the kinds of presentations you choose.
Well, now is next week. Or, I mean, relative to last week’s this week, when this week was last week, now this week is last week’s next week. Which is now.
For years now, I’ve noticed that when I embed a trick in an interesting immersive narrative, the responses are not only stronger, but the heat on the method itself becomes lesser.
I always assumed this is because the person gets caught up in the story and just becomes less focused on the secret of the trick.
But I have a new theory.
Imagine this:
I say, “I’m going to move this stuffed mouse across the table with my mind.” I concentrate. The mouse suddenly shoots across the table.
Now contrast that with this:
I say, “I have an invisible cat. He’s real frisky.” I set a stuffed mouse on the table and call out, “Get it, Mittens!” The mouse flies off the edge. I reach down to pick up Mittens. “That’s a good boy.”
In the first version, the person watching thinks: Wait… how did he move that mouse? Did he blow on it? Was there a string? Is it gimmicked in some way?
Their entire attention is fixed on the how of the effect—because that’s the only mystery I’ve presented.
But in the second version, something else happens.
When I tell people I know, “I have an invisible cat, and he loves to play,” my friends have learned not to think I’m crazy. Instead they think, “How will this play out? Hmm… an invisible cat. Okay, what am I about to see?”
Any unbelievable premise can create similar questions.
“This stone can generate coincidences.”
“I want you to slap me as hard as you can. I’m able to something weird when I’m in a pain state.”
“My grandmother was a witch. This is her old necklace.”
Anything like this will generate the question, “Okay, how will this play out?”
What’s kind of coincidence is this stone going to generate?
What power does he have in a “pain state”?
What weird thing is going to happen sitting around in this darkened room, late at night, with this witch’s necklace?
Do you see what’s happening here?
At the climax of the effect, they’re getting an answer.
Normally, the climax of a trick creates questions. It builds tension and leaves the spectator needing to resolve something. How did he do that? All the weight of the mystery is on that question.
But when you lead with an unbelievable premise, the climax of the trick can actually relieve tension.
It doesn’t answer the method question—“How did he do that?”—but it does answer the narrative one you planted earlier: “How is this going to play out?”
That’s what I mean by, the Narrative How.
I’m not suggesting they won’t still wonder how the stuffed mouse really flew off the table. But the need to “figure it out” is lessened—because you’ve already delivered a kind of answer. You gave them a resolution—a payoff.
You’re not just endlessly feeding into the dynamic where you know something they don’t know. You’ve posed a mystery—and provided a resolution. Yes, the resolution is impossible. But it’s still satisfying, because it answers the story question, not the method question.
But keep in mind, this only works if you commit to the premise. If you say, “This is my grandma’s necklace. She was a witch,” and then move on without setting up any atmosphere, tone, the premise feels hollow. There’s no tension to relieve at the end because you never really built any in the first place.
The power of creating narrative questions—and then answering them—is that it never gets old.
You offer an unbelievable premise—and then you seemingly prove it’s real. That dynamic is endlessly engaging. Different premises (or even the same premise with different proof) will always spark curiosity, because people love getting answers. They love watching something resolve. It’s like setting up a joke and giving them the punchline.
On the other hand, when everything hinges on how you did it, you're denying them any resolution. You’re inviting them to figure it out. And they will—either successfully, which weakens the moment… or unsuccessfully, which leaves them frustrated.
But you can distract that impulse with narrative resolution. You can redirect their curiosity somewhere where they will at least get some sort of satisfying answer.
Being fooled can be fun. It can be novel. But over time, the novelty fades—and with it, the enjoyment.
But a simple, crazy story that wraps up with a little bow—”He told me he had an invisible cat… and then something I couldn’t see swatted the cat-toy off the table!”—never loses its charm.
And I find, after a while, most people decide to just enjoy that part of the experience rather than waste their energy trying to find out how you did it.
