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* [[Robert A. Heinlein]] may have been trying to do this in his novel ''[[Podkayne of Mars]]'', with the title character being First-Person Peripheral Narrator for her [[Evil Genius]] younger brother Clark. It didn't really work, because she ended up being too strong a character to be overshadowed.
* Leo Borlock, the narrator of ''[[Stargirl]]'' by Jerry Spinelli, is a First-Person Peripheral Narrator for the title character.
* All four narrators of ''[[The Sound and
* Patrick, the nephew/narrator in ''[[Auntie Mame]]''.
* ''[[Danny, the Champion of the World]]'' doesn't necessarily come off this way throughout much of the narrative, but it ends like this:
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* Tim Wynne Jones' short story [http://www.hapon.com/9pdf/kerdydickussty.pdf ''Save The Moon For Kerdy Dickus''] begins with the line "This is Ky's story."—Ky being a friend of the young narrator, and her story being about a Stranger who came to Ky's family's house one evening {{spoiler|and thought that they were aliens}}. The friend telling the story was not there for the main events of the story at all. The First-Person Peripheral Narrator perspective is effective here because, as the narrator says flat out in the first paragraph, "In this story, the way things look is really important," and the fact that the narrator is neither as familiar with those things as Ky nor as unfamiliar with them as the Stranger emphasizes the fact that this story is all about the perspective from which it's told.
* The ''[[Silverwing (novel)|Silverwing]]'' series' third book actually ''has'' a character named Ishmael, though he appears near the end of the story, isn't given much characterization, and [[Red Shirt|dies during the climactic battle]].
* Just about all of H.G. Wells' books, including the above-mentioned ''Island of Dr. Moreau'' and ''The Time Machine,'' fall prey to this. Perhaps the only novel to avert this is ''[[The War of the Worlds (novel)|The War of the Worlds]],'' where the unnamed narrator is the protagonist by default because no other major characters last for more than a handful of chapters or have any real motives or character development.
* ''[[To Kill a Mockingbird]]'' has Scout watching her father's heroic attempt to save Tom Robinson's life. Scout does have her own adventures, but Atticus is the real man of action.
* Death, rather than the eponymous character, narrates ''[[The Book Thief]].''
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* In ''[[Halo]] 3: ODST'', the primary player character is the [[The Voiceless|mute,]] [[He Who Must Not Be Seen|faceless]] Rookie. For the flashback missions, you take control of his different squadmates, and the real stars of the story are your CO, Gunnery Sgt. Buck, and Veronica Dare.
** He does become the main character by the end of the game though, when he catches up with the events that happened over the last 6 hours.
* Most of the actual story in ''[[Diablo II]]'' is narrated by Marius, a random person whom the Dark Wanderer (Diablo) takes along to carry his stuff or something. He is eventually given the task to enter Hell itself to destroy Baal's soulstone, ie. to actually do something, but understandably chickens out. What's interesting is that if Marius is seen as First-Person Peripheral Narrator, then the main character is Diablo, not the [[Player Character]]. But since the latter only runs around killing monsters and [[Play the Game, Skip the Story|misses all the real story]], even Marius himself seems more like the protagonist at times.
* The ending to ''[[Valkyria Chronicles]]'' reveals that the whole thing has essentially been the scrapbook of Elle, a (somewhat annoying) journalist who had made it her mission to document Squad 7's adventures.
* The narrator of [[Narcissu]], who is not even given a name in-game, largely serves as a chauffeur and plot-catalyst for the real focus of the story, Setsumi. {{spoiler|Justified by reason #1 above.}} Setsumi herself fits this role to some degree vis-a-vis Himeko in the prequel, but she does at least get quite a bit of character development.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Narrator Tropes]]
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