About Emerald Coast Storytellers
Bringing Big City Culture to Our Small Beach Town
Emerald Coast Storytellers is a creative writers group based in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida that seeks to provide uniquely curated, live storytelling events revolving around the written and spoken word. Their mission is to help locals and visitors alike discover, foster, and reignite
their creative passions – both on and off the page.
Meet the Founders
Emerald Coast Storytellers began as a two-woman writing group and was inspired by all the things co-founders Kristy and Ali wished they’d had along the way in their own writing journeys: community, connection, accountability, and support. (To name a few.) What’s blossomed since has become the stuff of dreams, and they can’t wait to see what awaits in the chapters to come.
Kristy Holditch
Kristy Holditch is a published writer and aspiring novelist residing in Grayton Beach, Florida. With a Journalism degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder, her passion for writing took root long before then, but was ignited during a transformative semester abroad in Europe. Her adventures across the continent and beyond became the wellspring of her creative inspiration sparking a desire to capture the world around her through the written word.
In addition to her extensive travel-inspired portfolio, Kristy's work and interviews have been featured in publications such as Huffington Post, 30A.com, Beach Happy Magazine, Vie Magazine, Elite Daily, Elephant Journal, and more.
Kristy's professional journey took her into the realm of marketing, which she balances alongside her true passion project: her forthcoming, debut novel, “Just Passing Through.”
Beyond her own writing endeavors, Kristy is deeply involved in the literary community. As a Board Member and Marketing Manager for Longleaf Writers Conference, she plays a pivotal role in fostering community support around this unique nonprofit and helping to tell its story.
In 2017, Kristy met her now-husband Harrison and followed her heart's call from the mountains of Colorado to the shores of 30A, where she not only found a haven to call home but has since embraced a new title: mom. Alongside her role as a dedicated mom, she continues to nurture her creative projects.
She is the Co-Founder of Emerald Coast Storytellers.
Ali Diamond
Ali is a writer, entrepreneur, journalist, and aspiring author. Originally from Cross Plains, Wisconsin (yes, she’s a Cheesehead and Packers fan), Ali moved down to Santa Rosa Beach at the end of 2019.
Ali graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a degree in Journalism and high hopes of becoming the next Anderson Cooper, or Christiane Amanpour. Although she briefly wrote for her hometown newspaper, the Middleton Times-Tribune, her high school newspaper, the Cardinal Times, and even had a brief stint as one of the editors-in-chief of her middle school’s Yearbook Club (to make sure good pictures of her had been submitted), she decided to go in a different direction after college.
She’d been mentored in the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Weinert Center for Entrepreneurship, where one of her earliest attempts at organic entrepreneurship, among other things, was attempting to create a brand-new device for drink mobilization in bike baskets. While that endeavor was ultimately unsuccessful, she had the opportunity to join several teams and became involved in several different start-ups post-graduation. After a successful acquisition of her Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based start-up, Ali took the opportunity to finally move down to the sandy white beaches of 30A.
She is the Co-Founder of the Emerald Coast Storytellers and hopes to publish her first horror novel.
Program Partner
of the CAA
As part of its mission to foster the inclusive and collaborative advancement of the Arts in Walton County, the Cultural Arts Alliance may establish program partnerships with mission-aligned nonprofit and for-profit organizations in support of its vision for a thriving Walton County in which everyone can experience the power of the Arts.
