First published in 1929, Faulkner created his “love of the heart,” the beautiful and tragic Caddy Compson, whose story Faulkner told through separate monologues by his three brothers: the idiotic Benjy, the suicidal neurotic Quentin, and the monstrous jason.
p>
justine larbalestier liar
micah will freely admit she’s a compulsive liar, but that may be the only honest thing she’ll tell you. Over the years, she has cheated on everyone: her classmates, her teachers, even her parents. and she always managed to stay one step ahead of her lies. that is, until her boyfriend dies under brutal circumstances and her dishonesty begins to catch up with her. but is it possible to tell the truth when lying is as easy as breathing?
You are reading: Books with unreliable narrators
Taking listeners deep into the psyche of a young woman who will say almost anything to convince them, and herself, that she has finally come clean, Liar is a chilling thriller that will have listeners rocking. between truths and lies. until the end. honestly.
Jazz by Toni Morrison
Jazz by Toni MorrisonIn the winter of 1926, when everyone everywhere sees nothing but good things ahead, Joe Trace, a middle-aged door-to-door salesman of Cleopatra beauty products, shoots his teenage lover to death. At her funeral, Joe’s wife, Violet, attacks the girl’s corpse. This gripping and profound story of love and obsession takes us back and forth in time as it weaves a narrative out of the deep emotions, hopes, fears and realities of black urban life.
the white tiger of aravind adiga
balram halwai is a complicated man. server. philosopher. entrepreneur. assassin. Over the course of seven nights, in the scattered light of an absurd chandelier, Balram tells us the terrible and fascinating story of how he became a success in life, with nothing but his own ingenuity to help him. /p>
Born in the dark heart of India, Balram gets a break when he’s hired as a driver for the richest man in his town, two Pomeranians from the house (Puddles and Cuddles) and the rich man’s (very unlucky) son. Behind the wheel of his Honda City Car, Balram’s new world is a revelation. While his peers flip through the pages of weekly murders (“love, rape, revenge!”), barter for girls, drink liquor (lightning), and perpetuate the great cock cooperative of Indian society, Balram watches as his employers bribe foreign ministers in exchange for tax breaks, bartering for girls, drinking liquor (single malt whisky), and playing their own part in the chicken coop. Balram learns to siphon gasoline, deal with crooked mechanics, and refill and resell Johnnie Walker Black Label bottles (all but one). he also finds a way out of the roost that no one else inside can perceive.
six suspects for vikas swarup
Seven years ago, Vivek ‘Vicky’ Rai, the playboy son of Uttar Pradesh’s Home Minister, murdered Ruby Gill in a trendy restaurant in New Delhi simply because she refused to serve him a drink. now vicky rai is dead, murdered in her country house at a party she had organized to celebrate her acquittal. the police search each and every one of the guests. six of them are discovered with weapons in their possession.
In this elaborate murder mystery, we join Arun Advani, India’s best-known investigative journalist, as the lives of these six suspects unravel before our eyes: a corrupt bureaucrat; an American tourist; a member of a stone age tribe; a bollywood sex symbol; a mobile phone thief; and an ambitious politician. each has an equal chance of having pulled the trigger. Inspired by true events, Vikas Swarup’s long-awaited second novel is both a gripping page turner and an insightful look into the heart and soul of contemporary India.
in a dark, dark ruth ware wood
nora hasn’t seen clare in ten years. not since nora left school one day and never came back. Until, out of the blue, an invitation to Clare’s bachelorette party arrives. Is this a chance for Nora to finally put her past behind her? but something goes wrong. very bad. some things can’t stay secret forever.
a dark scanner by philip k. cock
substance d is not known as death for nothing. It is the most toxic drug to ever hit the streets of Los Angeles. it destroys the links between the two hemispheres of the brain, first causing disorientation and then complete and irreversible brain damage.
Undercover narcotics agent who calls himself Bob Arctor is desperate to discover the ultimate source of supply. but to find any kind of clue he has to pose as a user and, inevitably, unaware of what is going on, arctor soon becomes as addicted as the drug addicts he works among…
lolita by vladimir nabokov
humbert humbert, scholar, esthete, and romantic, has fallen utterly and utterly in love with lolita haze, the silky-skinned, gum-busting twelve-year-old daughter of her landlady. reluctantly agreeing to marry the lady. haze just to be around lolita, humbert suffers a lot in the search for romance; But when she begins to seek attention elsewhere, he leads her on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of her love. hilarious, quirky, heartbreaking, and full of clever puns, lolita is an unspoiled and unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, deception, and lust.
chuck palahniuk fight club
in his first novel, chuck palahniuk proved to be the most visionary satirist of his generation. Fight Club’s estranged narrator leaves his lackluster work when he falls into the thrall of Tyler Durden, an enigmatic young man who organizes secret boxing matches in the basement of bars. there two men fight “as long as they have to”. a gloriously original work that exposes what is at the core of our modern world.
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
Wuthering Heights by Emily BrontëSee Also: Imposter Syndrome: 10 Best Psychology Books to Overcome Self-Doubt
“my biggest thought in life is heathcliff. if all else perished and he remained, i would still be… nelly, i am heathcliff! he is always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure… but as my very being”. Wuthering Heights is the only novel by Emily Brontë, who died a year after its publication, at the age of thirty. A haunting Yorkshire tale of a love that is stronger than death, it is also a fierce vision of metaphysical passion, in which heaven and hell, nature and society, are powerfully juxtaposed. unique, mystical, with timeless appeal, it has become a classic of English literature.
the secret story of donna tartt
Under the influence of their charismatic classics professor, a group of intelligent and eccentric misfits at an elite New England university discover a way of thinking and living that is a world away from the humdrum existence of their contemporaries. . but when they go beyond the bounds of normal morality, they gradually slide from obsession to corruption and betrayal, and ultimately, inexorably, to evil.
the improper of mara dyer by michelle hodkin
Mara Dyer doesn’t think life could be any stranger than waking up in a hospital with no memory of how she got there. she can.
She thinks there must be something more to the accident that she can’t remember killed her friends and mysteriously left her unharmed. there are.
She doesn’t think that after everything she’s been through, she can fall in love. she’s wrong.
More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera
More Happy Than Not by Adam Silveraeva lesko natiello’s memory box
In this gripping psychological thriller, a group of privileged suburban moms have a blast googling everyone in town, digging up dirt to fuel prickly gossip. Caroline Thompson, a devoted mother of two, sticks to moral high ground and tries to avoid these women. she is relieved to hear that her name appears only three times, citing her philanthropy. Despite being grateful that she has nothing to hide, a belated twinge of insecurity prompts Caroline to google her maiden name, which none of the others know.
punches cascade like a tsunami. Caroline is terrified by what she reads. an obituary for her sister, jd? that’s absurd. with each click, the revelations become more alarming. they can’t be right. She would know Caroline falls into a state of paranoia, upending her happy family life, desperate to prove these accusations false before someone finds out they are true.
abigail haas dangerous girls
It’s spring break for senior year. Anna, Ella’s boyfriend Tate, Ella’s best friend Elise Ella and a few other close friends embark on a wild ride to Aruba that promises to be the time of Ella’s lives. But when Elise is found brutally murdered, Anna finds herself trapped in a country that is not her own, battling vile and derogatory accusations.
As Anna sets out to find her friend’s killer, she discovers hard truths about her friendships, the slippery nature of truth, and the pain of young love.
As she awaits the judge’s sentence, it becomes clear that everyone around her thinks she is not only guilty, but dangerous. when the truth comes out, it is more shocking than one could imagine…
Another Little Piece by Kate Karyus Quinn
Another Little Piece by Kate Karyus QuinnOn a crisp fall night, Annaliese Rose Gordon stumbled out of the woods and into a high school party. she was screaming drenched in blood. she then she disappeared.
A year later, Annaliese is found wandering a highway hundreds of miles away. she doesn’t know who she is. she doesn’t know how she got there. she only knows one thing: she’s not the real annaliese rose gordon.
now annaliese is haunted by strange visions and shattered memories. memories of a reckless and desperate desire… a bloody razor… and the faces of other girls who disappeared. Piece by piece, Annaliese’s fractured memories come together to reveal a violent and endless cycle that she will never escape unless she can unravel the twisted secrets of her past.
before I go to sleep by s.j. watson
christine wakes up every morning in an unknown bed with an unknown man. she looks in the mirror and sees an unknown middle-aged face. And every morning, the man she has woken up with must explain to her that he is Ben, he is her husband, she is forty-seven years old, and a terrible accident two decades earlier decimated her ability to form new memories.
See Also: 8 Essential Muay Thai Books
Each day, Christine must start anew rebuilding her past. and the closer he gets to the truth, the more incredible it seems.
herman koch’s dinner
It’s a summer evening in Amsterdam and two couples meet for dinner at a trendy restaurant. Between bites of food and polite scrapes of cutlery, conversation remains a soft murmur of polite speech: the banality of work, the triviality of vacation. but behind the empty words there are terrible things to be said, and with each forced smile and each new course the knives are sharpened.
Each couple has a fifteen-year-old son. the two children are united by their responsibility for a single horrible act; an act that triggered a police investigation and shattered the comfortable and isolated worlds of their families. as dinner reaches its culinary climax, the conversation finally turns to their children. As civility and friendship disintegrate, each pair shows just how far they’re willing to go to protect the ones they love.
let you go by clare mackintosh
In a split second, Jenna Grey’s world turns into a nightmare. her only hope of moving on is to walk away from everything she knows to start anew. Jenna, desperate to escape her, moves to a remote cabin on the Welsh coast, but her fears, her pain, and memories of a cruel November night haunt her forever.
Little by little, Jenna begins to glimpse the potential for happiness in her future. but her past is about to catch up with her, and the consequences of her will be devastating…
in lisa unger’s blood
On the verge of graduating from college in upstate New York, Lana Granger takes a job in the city taking care of eleven-year-old Luke. Kicked out of schools across the country, the manipulative Luke is used to controlling the people in his life. he likes to play games. but in wool he may have found his match. or has lana met yours?
because lana is a liar. she has told so many lies about where she comes from and who she is, that not even she can remember the truth.
Then, Lana’s closest friend, Beck, mysteriously disappears, and Lana’s alibi for the night of the disappearance doesn’t match eyewitness accounts. Now, Lana finds herself lying again: to her friends, to the police, to herself. Lana is willing to do almost anything to prevent the truth, about her last night with Beck, especially, from coming out. even so, it might not be enough to keep the shocking secrets of her dead and buried.
but someone knows all about lana’s lies. and they’re dying to tell about it.
carol goodman’s other mother
sometimes i lie about alice feeney
My name is Amber Reynolds. There are three things you should know about me: 1. I’m in a coma. 2. my husband doesn’t love me anymore. 3. sometimes I lie.
Amber wakes up in a hospital. she can’t move she can’t speak she can’t open her eyes. she can hear everyone around her, but they have no idea. Amber doesn’t remember what happened, but she suspects her husband had something to do with it. Alternating between her paralyzed present, the week before her accident, and a series of childhood diaries from twenty years ago, this brilliant psychological thriller asks: is anything really a lie if you believe it to be true? /p>
17& gone through nova ren sum
Seventeen-year-old Lauren has visions of girls who have disappeared. And all these girls have only one thing in common: they are seventeen years old and they are gone without a trace. As Lauren struggles to extricate herself from these waking nightmares, impossible questions demand urgent answers: Why do girls talk to Lauren? How can she help them? and… is she next? Through Lauren’s search for clues, things begin to unravel, and when a brush with death lands Lauren in the hospital, a shocking truth changes everything.
with complexity and richness, nova ren sum offers a fresh and beautifully visual interpretation of what it means to be lost.
How many of these dodgy narrator books have you read? What do you think of their narrators? let me know in the comments!
and for more information on books with dodgy narrators, see the genre kryptonite: dodgy narrators.
See Also: Martha Wells – Book Series In Order