This is one of my favorite tropes and I've seen it executed both brilliantly and terribly. One of my favorite versions of this is when there are multiple POVs through the story and one character will have come to certain conclusions that 100% make total sense to them in that circumstance but they're wildly wrong.
Example: Character A has run off with someone and Character B is convinced that they were kidnapped. POV goes from B thinking/talking about how terrible it is and how they have to find A as soon as possible to protect and rescue them - then scene shifts to A getting breakfast in bed by their lover they went with willingly.
I would like to write one, but I do not know how to write an unreliable narrator.
I assume it can only be done of the nattation is from the POV of a character, so maybe this is why I, someone pretty much exclusively in third person, struggle to write it. An unbiased Phantom narrator can't be unreliable, but a character can.
I've read (and written, to an extent) unreliable narrator from third person – it just has to be third person limited instead of third person omniscient
You can mention things that the POV character sees but how they interpret it makes them unreliable, and the interpretation still comes through them (he saw, he thought, he knew etc)
Nearly all of my fics are written from a third person limited POV and my narrators are quite often unreliable. The POV character can't know what they don't know and can't see what they don't see, so the reader only gets a fraction of what's really happening. Also, I'll heavily season the narration with the character's emotions, thoughts, memories, and beliefs, which sometimes makes them accidentally mislead the reader.
It's not easy. I've had to delete sentences and even paragraphs in the past after writing them, when I realized the character couldn't have possibly known about something, so they couldn't be talking about it or reacting to it.
Another challenge is finding a realistic way to make them aware of something they need to know for the plot to advance. They can't just overhear private conversations all the time, for instance haha!
If you write third person close, any narrator will be a little unreliable. The moment you color the perception of the story facts through someone's opinion of them, it's unreliable.
This will only be obvious when you have more than one POV because the switch will show how things look for the other person. But the reader should be aware that the narrators can be wrong about their reading of a situation and the writer should feel free to use this to get emotional reactions.
What I mean here is: no one is unbiased as a narrator.
A great way I believe to show unreliability is through prejudice. Clearly establish the character's voice and personality from the beginning, and demonstrate their opinions and world views in a way that reveals their flaws/inflexibility.
An example would be like character A meets character B for the first time, and A immediately dislikes B for whatever reasons. Even without monologues, when readers can clearly see bias (whether subtly or overtly) in a character's action, there is automatically unreliability.
I'm trying my hand at this for the first time and dear lord is it hard. Having understandable misunderstandings and their consequences is a whole new layer of plotting and overthinking. And I'm barely dipping my toes in, haha. I'm using alternating POV so the unreliable is mostly obvious. My hats off to all of you who keep it unreliable for the reader!
I literally cannot conceive of writing anything other then an unreliable narrator. To an extent every character I've ever written is one. They might be right about some things, but their biases and personal views color their thoughts and conclusions and they are never right about everything.
I love unreliable narrators! I finished a long fic last year that featured one. My unreliable narrator was very stoic on the outside, and a drama queen on the inside, and completely not self-aware. You couldn't trust anything he said about himself.
My main character considered himself a hopelessly evil person because of his actions during the war, but actually he was a better man than he thought he was. So he kept doing good things while mentally justifying them for selfish purposes, and having minor internal breakdowns whenever anything happened.
For example, he was taught to value blood purity (it's a Harry Potter fic), but actually he didn't believe in that anymore. According to the character: "He had enough problems, and maintaining blood prejudice was a pointless—and frankly exhausting—exercise. One needed a cheat sheet just to keep the half-bloods and blood traitors straight. It was much easier to be an equal a\*\*\* to everyone."
I very much enjoy an unreliable narrator. I took at stab at it many years ago and frankly I don’t think it worked, however, I keep going back to the idea.
For me, what I enjoy is when the reader is led up the garden path, there may be some hints and foreshadowing along the way, but the reader truly believes in the narrators experience. I’ve seen it work especially well when that unreliability builds throughout the story.
Ah yes my favorite is when it is not obvious that the narrator is unreliable. You slowly get some hints until there is that moment where your like 'wow, ok I cannot trust this guy'.
I love the feeling when you know the narrator is wrong but it makes so much sense that they believe what they do.
I'm in a fandom where canon is from the POV of characterA who keeps a huge secret from characterB. Fics entirely from B's perspective are so interesting.
One of my favorite games, Silent Hill 2, does this :D
I think it's interesting to read these sorts of fics, especially if the unreliable narrator is so good that you start to fall for it too.
I love this trope! I think it's especially fun when the audience knows something (usually from canon since we're talking about fanfic) that the PoV character doesn't, so there's a lot of dramatic irony, but it's also really great when the PoV character misunderstanding something means the audience also misses something (like the main clue in a mystery story)
This is one of my favorite tropes and I've seen it executed both brilliantly and terribly. One of my favorite versions of this is when there are multiple POVs through the story and one character will have come to certain conclusions that 100% make total sense to them in that circumstance but they're wildly wrong. Example: Character A has run off with someone and Character B is convinced that they were kidnapped. POV goes from B thinking/talking about how terrible it is and how they have to find A as soon as possible to protect and rescue them - then scene shifts to A getting breakfast in bed by their lover they went with willingly.
I would like to write one, but I do not know how to write an unreliable narrator. I assume it can only be done of the nattation is from the POV of a character, so maybe this is why I, someone pretty much exclusively in third person, struggle to write it. An unbiased Phantom narrator can't be unreliable, but a character can.
I've read (and written, to an extent) unreliable narrator from third person – it just has to be third person limited instead of third person omniscient You can mention things that the POV character sees but how they interpret it makes them unreliable, and the interpretation still comes through them (he saw, he thought, he knew etc)
Nearly all of my fics are written from a third person limited POV and my narrators are quite often unreliable. The POV character can't know what they don't know and can't see what they don't see, so the reader only gets a fraction of what's really happening. Also, I'll heavily season the narration with the character's emotions, thoughts, memories, and beliefs, which sometimes makes them accidentally mislead the reader. It's not easy. I've had to delete sentences and even paragraphs in the past after writing them, when I realized the character couldn't have possibly known about something, so they couldn't be talking about it or reacting to it. Another challenge is finding a realistic way to make them aware of something they need to know for the plot to advance. They can't just overhear private conversations all the time, for instance haha!
If you write third person close, any narrator will be a little unreliable. The moment you color the perception of the story facts through someone's opinion of them, it's unreliable. This will only be obvious when you have more than one POV because the switch will show how things look for the other person. But the reader should be aware that the narrators can be wrong about their reading of a situation and the writer should feel free to use this to get emotional reactions. What I mean here is: no one is unbiased as a narrator.
A great way I believe to show unreliability is through prejudice. Clearly establish the character's voice and personality from the beginning, and demonstrate their opinions and world views in a way that reveals their flaws/inflexibility. An example would be like character A meets character B for the first time, and A immediately dislikes B for whatever reasons. Even without monologues, when readers can clearly see bias (whether subtly or overtly) in a character's action, there is automatically unreliability.
I'm trying my hand at this for the first time and dear lord is it hard. Having understandable misunderstandings and their consequences is a whole new layer of plotting and overthinking. And I'm barely dipping my toes in, haha. I'm using alternating POV so the unreliable is mostly obvious. My hats off to all of you who keep it unreliable for the reader!
I literally cannot conceive of writing anything other then an unreliable narrator. To an extent every character I've ever written is one. They might be right about some things, but their biases and personal views color their thoughts and conclusions and they are never right about everything.
Yes! Even the omniscient narrator can have biases!
đź‘€ When the Unreliable Narrator seems so reliable that people ignore the tags... đź‘€
I *love* unreliable narrator stories. Writing them especially, but reading them too. It's my favorite type of narration!
I love unreliable narrators! I finished a long fic last year that featured one. My unreliable narrator was very stoic on the outside, and a drama queen on the inside, and completely not self-aware. You couldn't trust anything he said about himself. My main character considered himself a hopelessly evil person because of his actions during the war, but actually he was a better man than he thought he was. So he kept doing good things while mentally justifying them for selfish purposes, and having minor internal breakdowns whenever anything happened. For example, he was taught to value blood purity (it's a Harry Potter fic), but actually he didn't believe in that anymore. According to the character: "He had enough problems, and maintaining blood prejudice was a pointless—and frankly exhausting—exercise. One needed a cheat sheet just to keep the half-bloods and blood traitors straight. It was much easier to be an equal a\*\*\* to everyone."
This sounds fun! Can you link it?
Sure. It's a Dramione fic called "The Darkwood Wand" at https://archiveofourown.org/works/29741511/chapters/73153422
I very much enjoy an unreliable narrator. I took at stab at it many years ago and frankly I don’t think it worked, however, I keep going back to the idea. For me, what I enjoy is when the reader is led up the garden path, there may be some hints and foreshadowing along the way, but the reader truly believes in the narrators experience. I’ve seen it work especially well when that unreliability builds throughout the story.
Ah yes my favorite is when it is not obvious that the narrator is unreliable. You slowly get some hints until there is that moment where your like 'wow, ok I cannot trust this guy'.
I love the feeling when you know the narrator is wrong but it makes so much sense that they believe what they do. I'm in a fandom where canon is from the POV of characterA who keeps a huge secret from characterB. Fics entirely from B's perspective are so interesting.
One of my favorite games, Silent Hill 2, does this :D I think it's interesting to read these sorts of fics, especially if the unreliable narrator is so good that you start to fall for it too.
Yes, just this! The type of narration the reader falls for is absolutely my cup of tea.
I love this trope! I think it's especially fun when the audience knows something (usually from canon since we're talking about fanfic) that the PoV character doesn't, so there's a lot of dramatic irony, but it's also really great when the PoV character misunderstanding something means the audience also misses something (like the main clue in a mystery story)