Today’s literary suspect is: The Unreliable Narrator.

Have you ever listened to someone narrate a fight and wondered if you all weren't at the same scene?

Interesting.

Because the issue is not the story. It is the storyteller!

The narrator is omitting some pretty obvious details, and you have to read between the lines to make sure that you're not being roped into a cheap thrills ride when you know where the limo is parked!

A good example is that friend reporting an argument and conveniently removing their own wrongdoing.

In literature, this is called Unreliable Narration — when a narrator gives information that cannot be fully trusted due to bias, trauma, manipulation, limited knowledge, ego, memory gaps, or deliberate deception.

And as we know…

social media has produced millions of modern narrators.

Everyone is editing. Everyone is framing. Everyone is omitting.

Very few people are telling complete stories... Well, maybe we don't really need every detail but you're still unreliable 😅

Unreliable narration presents real facts with skewed interpretation and the reader is left to wonder: why are we being told a twisted tale when we can have the straight one?

More examples are:

- Breakup stories told one-sided

- Social media “my life is perfect” narrators

- Politicians rewriting reality in papers 

- Memory distortion

- “I’m fine” when someone clearly isn’t

- And we that edit our stories to survive guilt.

So before you believe the story... ask who's holding the pen. 

Princess Ella ⚜️