Unreliable Narrator

Where the narrator's point of view is unreliable and cannot be trusted.

Quite often these narrators (the people telling the story) have issues, which affect their judgement/truth. Because of this, their credibility is seriously compromised.

For example they can be:
--heavily medicated
--suffering from a form of depression or traumatic stress related illness
--loss of memory though a head bump
--loss of memory through dementia
--lying to cover up something (often they are murderers)
--just plain old crazy

Types of unreliable narrators (from WIki):

Sometimes the narrator's unreliability is made immedi
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The Girl on the Train
Gone Girl
We Were Liars
The Silent Patient
We Have Always Lived in the Castle
Lolita
The Woman in the Window
The Secret History
The Catcher in the Rye
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (Hercule Poirot, #4)
Yellowface
Fight Club
Sometimes I Lie
Piranesi
The Great Gatsby
Iris Murdoch
Even if readers claim that they 'take it all with a grain of salt', they do not really. They yearn to believe, and they believe, because believing is easier than disbelieving, and because anything which is written down is likely to be 'true in a way'. I trust this passing reflection will not lead anyone to doubt the truth of any part of this story! When I come to describe my life with Clement Makin credulity will be strained but will I hope not fail! ...more
Iris Murdoch, The Sea, the Sea

Helen Oyeyemi
Maybe she was not really like that. It's just that I would prefer you to think that what happened to her was justified. ...more
Helen Oyeyemi, White Is for Witching

More quotes...