"A big part of getting where I am today is putting myself out there and not worrying about rejection."

Tawny Lara on thinking outside the book-marketing box, coordinating with a coauthor, and her new card deck, THE SOBRIETY DECK

Check out the collection of past Words With (Author) Friends, wherein I g-chat with an author and you get to read over my shoulder, and order Tawny’s new, coauthored card deck, perfect for Dry January and available now.

---

Tawny: Hello, friend!

Me: Hiiii!

Big congrats on The Sobriety Deck! How are you feeling??

Thank you so much! Feeling all of the launch feels of course. Realizing I'm still recovering from book launch but v excited to share this experience with a coauthor! Such a cool, new experience.

(and v excited to be chatting with you, one of my fav authors 😎)

Aw, thank you! Obviously I typically talk to novelists in this space, but I'm so happy to be chatting with you about something a little different. Can you share what the deck's all about and how it came together with a coauthor?

Thanks for thinking of me, especially since card decks are having a publishing moment right now. Which is actually where my idea The Sobriety Deck came about. I noticed bookstores and gift shops carrying various decks. So I thought... where's the sobriety deck?!?! I asked my podcast cohost if she'd want to write it together and she was down! We basically turned our podcast episodes and life lessons learned in sobriety into a card deck

The log line is: a 50-card self-help card deck for anyone on the sobriety spectrum

Such a great idea! Can you give some examples of the kind of stuff people will find on the cards?

We divided those 50 cards into 5 sections (relationships, showing up, sobriety toolkit, experiencing joy, and knowing ourselves. Lisa (cohost/fellow author) and I started our podcast in 2018, recording over 250 episodes. So we distilled a lot of those episodes into easy-to-read reflection prompts and resources

Awesome. And how do you see people using the deck in real time?

We're already hearing incredible feedback from our listeners and peers. Some therapists and counselors are using the deck with their clients which means the world to us! Listeners are posting pics of their card along with their hand-written reflection/writing prompt. It's so cool to see how people engage with this lil deck!

That's so cool! Let's talk about process and how this came to be. You noticed decks are having a moment and decided to make one together...then what??

I love talking process/industry so v excited for this part 😊

yaaaay