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Q&A Preserve "The Reveal" vs lying to the reader

But I can't have the narrator simply lie to the reader Sure you can. That's called an unreliable narrator. Instead of having a generic narrator-to-reader chapter, your "The Story So Far" mate...

posted 8y ago by Lauren Ipsum‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

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#4: Attribution notice removed by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-13T12:00:36Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/22111
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T05:16:39Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/22111
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by (deleted user) · 2019-12-08T05:16:39Z (almost 5 years ago)
> But I can't have the narrator simply lie to the reader

Sure you can. That's called an _unreliable narrator._

Instead of having a generic narrator-to-reader chapter, your "The Story So Far" material can be delivered via some other medium, or two characters who aren't in your story otherwise. It can be a newspaper article, a series of emails, a radio broadcast, two people talking, a lecture, or anything else.

So have a history teacher talking to a class. Write the introduction to a thesis. Make it a religious sermon, or a mom talking to her child, telling the child The Story So Far.

Any of these narrators have the potential to be unreliable — to edit, to omit, to lack information, to embroider, to editorialize. Your reader gets just the information you want, and you haven't outright lied.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2016-05-24T15:26:37Z (over 8 years ago)
Original score: 7