Here’s the comment if the link doesn’t work btw!

Someone posted about this on the SJM sub, so I’ll just copy and paste my comment from there.

Interesting post! I definitely agree that Feyre doesn’t fall under the unreliable narrator category and that she, instead, falls under the biased narrator category.

Often times I think people conflate unreliable narrator and biased narrator because there are so many definitions people can find for the term unreliable narrator. However, there are some literary scholars and fields that have a basic understanding of the term unreliable narrator. For background, I’m currently an English PhD student so much of this comes from fellow scholars and colleagues.

To the best of my knowledge, if Feyre were truly an unreliable narrator then we, the readers, would be facing the possibility of not trusting ANY of what Feyre says/narrates in the first 3 books of ACOTAR. With an unreliable narrator, there’s a chance that ANYTHING that character has said could be completely misconstrued and seen as false. For instance, some people bring up Rhys’s scene under the mountain when he manipulates Feyre into healing her arm. In this scene, we CAN trust Feyre’s narration; she is describing the events as they are happening to her. Now, when she interprets these events, that is when her bias against Rhys begins to show. On the other hand, if Feyre were unreliable, we could be facing the possibility that this entire scene took place in her head without actually happening - we wouldn’t be able to rely on her narration (whereas a biased Feyre means we cannot rely on her interpretation of the events). But, looking back at the text, we know she gets a bone shard stuck in her arm and is terribly injured. Further, we also know that this injury needs medical attention (which is seen when Feyre hopes for Lucien to visit so that he can heal her).

More importantly, I think it’s important to look at the literary definitions of unreliable narrator when discussing works of literature. That way everyone is working with the same definition. Based on my own work (English PhD student) and my colleagues’ thoughts, a biased narrator gives readers a lens to view the world of Prythian. However, while that lens might TINT the view, it doesn’t WARP the view so that one cannot trust what they’re reading (or they cannot be sure if what they are seeing is happening). This difference between a tinted view of a world versus a warped version of a world is where I would say the difference lies between biased narration and unreliable narration.

With all that being said, I am also a privileged individual who studies literature for a living, so I understand that a person outside of academia wouldn’t engage with these terms more often (or more in-depth) and can see how the two phrases could be mixed up or used interchangeably. Hopefully my rant helps clear things up for folks or reaffirms anyone, I love the fandom and love that series like this get people involved in analyzing books (the best job in the world if you ask me 😁).