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The Dark Night Of The Soul (The Long Road Ahead)

The Dark Night Of The Soul (The Long Road Ahead)

This week I started reading Save the Cat by Blake Snyder.

Beat 12 of Snyder's Beat Sheet stands out to me today.
This is where the protagonist reaches the darkest point of the journey and questions his or her abilities, allowing self-doubt to creep in.

Have I reached The Dark Night of the Soul?  Yes.
And no. The other part of the beat is that this is also the place just before the dawn.

In my last post I mentioned that I was busy with two edits of my manuscript. The read-through took five days, the line by line took two weeks. I completed the line by line in a six-hour sprint on Monday. (There are holidays in the UAE and we are off for the entire week. Eid Al Adah to those celebrating.)
I also mentioned that I had someone in mind to do a copyedit of the book. I reached out, and the feedback I received was … Unexpected. My acquaintance let me know in a very kind way that the manuscript is not at the stage for copy editing and that it would be better to have it go through a developmental edit. He’s right and it does needs work.


What I noticed as I did the line by line with ProWritingAid is that I make copious use of weak verbs/ passive voice and glue words in my sentences.
I further realised that in trying to be clever I was actually being amateurish. Particularly when using non standard dialog tags. By example, “Are you insane” Declared Bill instead of “Are you insane” Said Bill. (There is no character named Bill and no one said that in the book by the way.)

So, with all these realisations I still thought. It’ll be fine. Let’s send it and see. And then the feedback came.


There is light on the horizon. I needed to hear this truth. My lady and first reader gave me feedback on areas to improve, but I thought I had caught it all. I needed an outsider to give me a critical review of the writing. So while he said the dialogue, action and scenario is lively. He also said that the script is at an early stage.
It was disheartening and my ego took a bruising. I talked it through with my lady and we agreed that it’s a blessing. I’d be flailing around, potentially for years, if I didn’t hear that now.
The truth shows me the path forward. The road is long and I know the destination. I thought I was further along but the car itself needs work. And that car, in this lame metaphor, is writing craft.
The first clue should have come as I edited with ProWritingAid. I kept on referring to my copy of Line by Line: How to Edit Your Own Writing (Claire Kehrwald Cook) to figure out how sentences work and why PWA kept on flagging me. Yes i had to go back to; Subject, Predicate, Object. Scary.
Scared? Don’t run away reader…

So what’s next?
My would-be copyeditor recommended that I look for a developmental editor and book coach and I agree.
After moping around for thirty minutes, I got on to Reedsy and did some searching. I chose five editors whose profiles gelled and sent requests.
Two have come back already. Both sound great. One is ready to start as early as 1 July. I'll wait for all the quotes to come in and then decide.

Despite the disappointment, I feel energised and more motivated now. The path is further away, but it’s clearer too.

Stay tuned.