It is week 2 of my British Novel class. The reading assignment for this week was Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier. The story is told by the narrator John Dowell. He opens the book with the statement " I don't know how it is best to put this thing down - whether it would be better to try and tell the story from the beginning, as if it were a story; or whether to tell it from this distance of time..." The narration jumps back and forth in time. The reader is left to figure out the sequence of events based on the narrator's disconnected thoughts and perception of the characters and of the events. We want to believe Dowell because he was there and he was a witness to the events. Unfortunately, Dowell was viewing social behavior and his perceptions of this behavior. All is not as it seems. The characters were acting one way in public and another behind closed doors. Dowell is duped and deceived by both his wife and his friends. Is Dowell a reliable or unreliable narrator? Dowell was viewing social behavior for 9 years and never seemed to look beyond the social norms of the time. However, as the story unfolds and the truth is revealed to Dowll, he does pass it on to the reader. By the end of the story, we have all of the events, perceptions and truths that Dowell is able to provide.