List compiled from various (unreliable) online sources.

Every single one of these that I've read (about two thirds) is brilliant. Except for the Martin fucking Amis one. Reliable narrators are rubbish.

One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest was my fave book for years and years, still highly rate it. Should be included in the Great American Literature thread now I come to think about it.

The other Kesey link - I'd want a mention for "The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test" somewhere in the FOF literature week, just not sure where.

Horse Badorties man.

The Fan Man

She was Lo in the morning... :)

Honourable mention for Tours of the black clock by Steve Erickson. Not sure if the narrator is unreliable, but he's certainly dodgy.

Lolita for me. Though Pale Fire's one of the best examples of an unreliable narrator as the whole premis hinges on his unreliability. Ditto the Good Soldier.

I wonder how unreliable Alex the droog is though. Surely he pretty much calls a spade a spade throughout the entire novel?

And as much as I love Money and think it Amis' best book, I would've thought Success would have been a better example of the ol' U.R.

^_^ What a book!


I was surprised to see The Great Gatsby on this list. Nick Carroway is an excellent narrator, and tells lets us know that he's "one of the few honest people" he knows.

Can somebody remind me how Alex's narration is unreliable in A Clockwork Orange?!

It's so long since I read it that I'm stumped.

I'll have to read it again too, but as far as I can remember his narration is pretty upfront and honest isn't it? Then again, maybe he's automatically classified as being unreliable because of his criminal tendencies?

Also, just thought of another one: Thomas Mann's Felix Krull Confidence Man. Great book (albiet 1st part of an unfinished series)

[/QUOTE]
I was surprised to see The Great Gatsby on this list. Nick Carroway is an excellent narrator, and tells lets us know that he's "one of the few honest people" he knows. [/QUOTE]

Well, he would say that wouldn't he...

:o

:unsure:


He's reading this isn't he?


I don't think Holden Caulfield or the Remains of the Day guy are particularly unreliable either...maybe just selective with their information.

Is the lad in The Go-Between "unreliable"?
Admittedly he's a bit naive what with that unfortunate "umbrella" experience...

:applaud: Yes!

I would add The Irrestistible Inheritance Of Wilberforce by Paul Torday to this marvellous list.

turn of the screw

by the end of it you have no idea what has happened at all but you certainly have a better idea of the narrator and narration

agree that unreliable narrators are best (if only for the fact that the premise that there is an agreed reality and an agreed way of representing will always be suspect and has to be subject to continuous scrutiny: realism in the novel and its reliable narrators always inclines towards encouraging the status quo in some way or other

Some good books here, but my favourite Unreliable Narrator is Severian, in Gene Wolfe's "Book of The New Sun." He keeps saying that he forgets nothing, and there's no reason not to believe that, but he misses out huge chunks without explanation, will tell the same story so that is seems like a new event the second time, and is often misleading, at best. An amazing book, by the way.

The French Lieutenant's Woman – John Fowles, studied it for A level. I thought the main character was a confused turd of a man.

Yes, and one of the great series of the 20th century. It is not surprising that Wolfe has been called the greatest living American writer regardless of genre.

Also hardly surprising that he rarely gets mentioned in the UK mainstream press, considering the genre he works in. (I've only ever seen him mentioned once in an English newspaper. Never on TV.)
Science Fiction is a huge genre these days, but only TV SF; written SF is as ignored as it always has been.

Time's Arrow.

Amis's masterpiece, with a deceptively simple, howlingly funny narrative device about sheer horror.