9thhousepub

This review is about the 4-month online program offered by KristaLyn (@therealkristalyn) and Emily (@likerofwords). Overall, the Forgotten Storytellers has a lot to offer, and I found many aspects of it truly helpful and life-changing, but the program still needs some serious adjustments for it to be worth the 4k+ it costs.

The Pros
-Emily's guided meditations, activations and techniques to remove energetic, spiritual and psychological blockages are fantastic and extremely helpful, specially if you feel these things are what are preventing you from writing a novel.
-KristaLyn is very knowledgeable about astrology and her materials helped me look into it in more detail. Most of the actually information had to be researched on my own though, since her guidelines were fairly basic. I admit it was helpful to dig deeper into elements of my birth-chart, like chiron, which were not on my radar before but more of a 1:1 with KristaLyn would have been better instead of digging through the internet to find information.
-Having a community of like-minded individuals is helpful to break out of the isolation many of us, writers, tend to crawl into.
-My overall objective when I signed up was to get rid of blockages and learn how to step into my flow more easily in order to complete my novel. That was achieved.

The Cons
-Except the 1:1 meeting at the very beginning, which is only 30 mins. Long and feels very rushed, participants have little to no access to Emily's and KristaLyn gifts and abilities or any additional 1:1 interaction or input. Any questions or doubts that were not of the general variety were dismissed and it was suggested we should paying additional money for a private session instead.
-The core of the program takes place during the first two months and during the last two months there is little interaction outside of a weekly Q&A. This is when you devote most of your time to writing, which makes sense. But it ends up feels like you paid $4,000 for a two month program, which comes with a complementary 2 months of writing on your own but with the vague notion that a group of other people in the program are writing as well. That all fine, as long as you are aware that what you are paying for is NOT 4 months-worth of learning and workshopping, just two.
-There is very little sharing of your actual work with others, zero critiquing and very little guidance on structure, tone, tempo, etc.
-The retreat costs an additional $2,500 and it entails simply hanging out in a small, isolated town of Pennsylvania and having time to write. Again, there is no workshopping or critiquing of anyone's work.
-There is a mandatory $500, non-refundable, deposit fee for the retreat. If you cannot attend, they offer a virtual experience, which ended up being simply logging into a live-feed of the coffee shop where participants were siting down writing on their own. Virtual participants were not able to actually participate and engage with other live or virtual participants. There $500 deposit fee ends up having no value and the other $2,000 for the retreat feel like a hefty price for simply being given time to work on your novel without.
-A lot of promises of extra perks and interactions were continuously promised and later not delivered, which made it hard to manage your expectations.
-Responses to questions or concerns were often curt and dismissive.
-A lot of the techniques that were taught are also available on their tiktok and podcast for free.
-The affiliate list offered at the end is very short (5-7 people some with broken links) + there is only one beta reader.
-There is no actual, practical guidance on how to approach or contact reps or publishers.

Summary
If what you are looking for is connecting with other writers who are also into magic, astrology, spirituality, etc; and you need help getting rid of blocks, developing a deeper understanding of magic, learning how it can influence your creativity, and how to push your writing to the next level, this is the program for you. Just be ware of the cost. You may not get everything you were promised. In my opinion, the program is worth $2,000.

To make it worth the $4,000, there should be an additional 1:1 sessions with KristaLyn focusing solely on astrology; another 1:1 with Emily focusing on spiritual guidance and insights; structured sessions where you get to peer-review your work; more hands-on guidance on how to take your novel from the first draft to the finished product and the how to approach publishers or reps. But other professionals and other programs may be better suited for those more technical, hands-on components.

I'd recommend it without hesitation if it was worth $2,000, that way you can skip the retreat and and spend the other $2,500 on a different retreat or on hiring beta readers or even a content editor.

The picture below shows 1 of 4 payments + a $500 mandatory retreat deposit.

Pros: The self-guided meditations and block pulling was helpful
Cons: Amateur instructors at an expert level price tag

I expected the astrology & spiritual writing course would be fun. Instead, it offers all the drawbacks of a traditional writing course (i. E. typical classroom instruction, sit quietly and listen, raise-your-hand-to-speak type of class) and none of the useful practical teachings (i. E. story structure). Most importantly, it was never really clear whether a spiritual or astrology question would be answered which is confusing to say the least.

KristaLyn and Emily leave a lot to desire as instructors. They are clueless about facilitating lessons and Q&As. I'll offer a specific example. During one of our Q&A sessions, KristaLyn spoke to a particular transit that was occurring at the time. I asked how I might interpret the transit passing through my 12th house and she dismissed my question saying it was not an appropriate question for the Q&A. Literally on their website (June 2,2022) they list a bullet point that reads, "the forgotten storytellers program teaches you: How to write in alignment with YOUR specific Astrological Birth Chart." I don't have a background in astrology, so I signed up to learn about my birth chart, as the website promises. How is this question not appropriate for a Q&A?

What I did learn quickly during my time in the program is that it was common practice for Emily and Kristalyn to conveniently maneuver their way out of a question. A lot of the questions that were asked by participants were deferred to youtube videos, the book, or they would simply dismiss the question altogether. What is the point of having a Q&A if you're not going to answer your question? Clearly, they did not know the answers and are not prepared to run a program of this magnitude. Full disclosure, I stopped attending the Q&A calls after the first two months.

Their contract promises regular 1:1 sessions which I found out was a complete lie. There is one 1:1 session at the beginning of the program. The majority of the program is concentrated in the first two months and could easily be sold as a self-instructed online course with a forum for connecting with fellow participants at a small fraction of the cost. The last two months of the program consist of weekly Q&A calls that do not justify the 1k monthly tuition.

Both, the 1-hr Q&As and the live lessons ran short every time. I'm talking about 20-30 min short to be specific. This is simply unacceptable for the $4,000+ price tag. When approached about particular issues and concerns about how the program was running, their reply was simply that we signed a contract and it was up to us to make the most out of it. Stay away from the Forgotten Storytellers Program!

Summary - nice people, still figuring out how to run a quality program, and are not open to constructive feedback.

What you pay: Monthly $1075USD for 4 months. + an optional $2500USD retreat (the first $500 required for enrollment in the program)

What I learned:

Storytelling (structure, character development, plot arcs, pacing)
This is all available online, or you could buy The High Vibe Hero's Journey for about $15 on amazon.

Spirituality (astrology, psychic information)
Most of the content around spiritual healing, astrology and psychic information is also available online for free if you follow Emily and KristaLyn on their social media or listen to their podcast.

The Mighty Networks private social platform
Their support in the Mighty Networks group offered optional writing prompts, weekly check-ins, and cheerleading. At no point was any form of constructive feedback welcome.

One hour-long Zoom Meetings required mic's off and the chat feature was open (first 2 months 2x/week - a lesson and a Q&A, second two months 1x/week for a Q&A)
The 8 lessons covered content that is available for free elsewhere.
The 16 Q&As were a space for us to ask questions, but the facilitation of them could be improved. Unless our questions were directly related to writing there were left unanswered (left unaddressed in the chat, or dismissed), and our questions about writing were often pushed aside as a "second draft problem" or to "YouTube it" for help (ie how to write an action scene). Not a single Q&A ran for the full hour. They claimed to be "giving us our writing time back." A Q&A of this price tier should include discussion prompting questions from the facilitators, not just an open-ended "how are you doing this week?" or repeating our discussions from the private social media group.

There was also a writing retreat. I didn't attend it because the additional $2000USD was not feasible for me. They initially promised a 4-day retreat, with most meals included, including a workshop a shopping trip and writing sprints. Two months later, when they needed to have an attendance list, the retreat was a travel day (check-in at 4 pm), 2 full days where only breakfast was included, and check-out was early on the fourth day. You also were required to pay for your own travel fees. I couldn't justify these cutbacks without a reduced price tag.

In addition, the retreat - which I paid the $500 deposit for, could have easily been more inclusive via zoom. The attendees were "gifted" a blanket, a bag of custom-blended coffee grounds, and a glass dip pen with ink. Virtual attendees like myself also paid the $500 deposit and received a custom-blended bag of coffee, and a glass dip pen (no ink). One might argue that part of the deposit was to book my accommodation at the BnB where the retreat was to take place, but given that the date that I let them know that I was not going to be attending the retreat was well before the BnB's cancellation policy that doesn't track. In short, I paid $500 for a glass dip pen and some coffee - which I don't even drink (but no alternative "gift" was offered).

The best part:
Included in the course materials were pre-recorded guided channelled meditations that would activate different aspects of writing for you. I found these to be the most helpful and wish I could continue to use them for future projects. However, they've rescinded access to those with the conclusion of the course, claiming that it is their intellectual property. Sure, that sounds legit, until you realize that you can buy a song for $0.99 to listen to forever, or any book you can buy to read as much as you'd like.

In conclusion:
These two are wonderful humans, trying to offer a unique program incorporating their spiritual gifts and writing. The program simply costs too much and gives too little exclusive content.

Their Defense:
Some members of the group and I reached out to Emily and KristaLyn with our concerns and a request for a partial refund. We were stonewalled, they refused to offer a refund (unsurprising), but also were dismissive of our constructive feedback. They claim that their price point is more than fair and cited several other comparable writing programs. When looking into those writing programs, they all had numerous reviews stating that the attendees felt outright scammed. If you're comparing your program to another and claiming yours is better... maybe make sure you're not making the same mistakes as they are?