1st person in denial

[AliceScarlett]

Riddle me this MN:

The narrator is different from the actual character as they are telling you about something that happened in the past. They are different to who they were when the story happened. They have come to new realisations, learnt lesson, etc. So how can you write someone who is in denial and unreliable without blatently tricking the reader?

Maybe I'm overthinking this?

I can't give any tips as such, but I would recommend reading Alice Feeney "Sometimes I lie" and Sabine Durrants "Lie with me" both have unreliable narrators and their execution is superb.

Are you saying that you don't want your readers to realise the narrator is talking about him/herself?

I don't quite understand your question?

If you use past tense, then the narrator can easily be in first person saying I did this, I thought that etc without any trickery or conflict. Some authors hint that a deeper understanding has occurred since the event described such as 'little did I know this was the tip of the iceberg'

The best first person narrators for me are accidentally unreliable though. As aren't we all? None of us know and understand everything about our experiences. sugar money is a great example of this, where the mc is telling his story but it's obvious to the reader he is misunderstanding actions and events.

Hope that helps?!

Does it need to be retrospectively narrated? You could use the present tense, or, say, diary entries, so the narrator only knows what's happened that day...?

Molly Keane's 1980 novel Good Behaviour has a brilliant unreliable narrator who is completely deluded -- the (cruel and very black) comedy comes from the fact that the reader sees through her delusions all the time to what is in fact going on, like the fact that she thinks a visiting friend of her brothers is in love with her when in fact they're having an affair and using her as a smokescreen.

I don't understand my question either. I'll get there.

It sounds like 'The Go-Between' to me.
Tricking the reader is part of the fun. Give your reader lots of credit.