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Did you read Forces by Invnarcel this month? A little dark, a little twisted, maybe a journey you weren't quite expecting... just right to get us in the mood for Fall! Enjoy my interview with Invnarcel below, then leave your comments on his story or writing! Chocolate or Vanilla? Chocolate. If you had 30 minutes of free time, what would you do? Meditate and connect with myself. It’s relaxing and great. What brought you to GA? A love of reading and posting gay stories! Is there a literary character (in the whole universe of fiction) that you’ve read who you really identified with? Not really. I feel like a very multi-faceted being. A lot of my own characters represent facets of me or facets I used to have. Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing? Not really. I can be bad at getting inspiration at times, but so can anyone. When I was more amateurish I used to have a problem with excessive adverbs. What’s the first thing you do when you start to write a story? Jot down a ‘plot skeleton’. The meat of the story then gets filled in as I write. Even if the story is very freeform I still write a ‘chapter skeleton’ for the first chapter even if it’s just three or so points. If you had to pick a favorite among the characters in Forces, who would it be and why? I would have to say Stanley Milton. Though the main character has his own interesting psychology and I relate to him way more, Stanley is a character I did the most research for. He is very peculiar and a lot of the story’s focus is on trying to figure out what kind of person he really is. I think he’s fascinating and I hope other people do too. What inspired you to write Forces? Before writing my gay-thriller-romance novellas I read two books because we know that reading other stories helps with our writing. Before starting Forces I read a psychology book and an old French novel about narcissists talking about their romantic exploits. The angle I took with Forces was different to my other novellas so I was looking forward to exploring that. Your stories can have many dark elements that are well-written to leave readers guessing. Did you do research about psychopaths for Stanley’s character or did you wing it? I read a full clinical textbook in preparation for Stanley called ‘The Mask of Sanity’ by Dr Hervey Cleckley. In fact most characters are named after researchers cited in that book, including my main character Phillip Cleckley. Prior to Forces I’d also read other psychology books including memoirs. Research and capturing realism is very important to me. Do you want to share anything about your current work-in-progress or the next story you plan to share on GA? I don’t know much about it yet. I do know that my characters are older now, since writing about high school kids is something I wanted to branch away from being a 25-year-old myself. Phillip and Stanley were 22-years-old and so university/college students in their early twenties will most likely be the focus of my next novella. I will probably go back to exploring supernatural elements, it has always been a guessing game in my past four novellas whether or not the supernatural is involved. I’ve touched on incels in the past, and I’m curious to explore that dark and messy realm of human psychology. For now I haven’t decided on anything. Don't forget to leave your comments on Forces below!

It's a month of changes, and this story was written to make you wonder... are things what they seem? Are are the characters who they seem? I guess you'll have to read Invnarcel's story, Forces, to find out! Forces by @Invnarcel Length: 35,514 Description: Phillip Cleckley is a young journalist investigating a murder at Lochdale college. He begins an unfortunate liaison with the prime suspect, the wealthiest family's son Stanley Milton. Both men are different, but together they find a similarity. A Reader said: Well it certainly kept me guessing. Good story!! Thanks invnarcel! ~KayDeeMac Don't forget to come back to comment on the discussion day on Monday, September 28th!