We last interviewed Tom Bonnick, Business Development Manager at Nosy Crow, after his big win at the IPG awards earlier this year. We clearly can’t get enough of him! Here Stephanie Cox interviews Tom about his role at Nosy Crow and his recent nomination as a Bookseller Rising Star.

1. Please introduce yourself to our readers and give an overview of your career so far.

I’m the business development manager at Nosy Crow, where I’ve worked for the past four years. It’s quite a wide-ranging role: I work on all of our digital and audio publishing, web development, digital marketing and social media, event planning, and other kinds of new business.

2. How did you go about securing the internship that lead to your employment at Nosy Crow?

Largely through luck and good timing! I discovered Nosy Crow through Twitter when they were very small and new – they hadn’t published any books yet at that stage – and sent an email asking if I could meet them. I did a few weeks’ work experience with them in 2011, when I’d come home to London intending to revise for my final exams, and then after I’d sat the exams I came straight back and never left!

3. How did it feel to be named as a BookSeller Rising Star?

It was a very happy surprise. I was particularly touched by this blogpost that my boss, Kate Wilson, wrote about the news.

4. What are the biggest challenges in organising a real-world publishing event, and equally what’s the most rewarding part?

I am hugely ill-suited to event-planning: I feel constant anxiety in the weeks leading up to an event that one of any number of things will go wrong (not selling enough tickets, a speaker not turning up, technology failing, or worst of all, the wine running out) and so I suppose the biggest challenge is simply coping with the stress. The most rewarding part probably comes afterwards, once the event is over!

5. Can you tell us a little bit about the culture and working environment at Nosy Crow?

It’s an incredible company to work for: it is filled with people who are immensely creative, intelligent and passionate about what they do.

6. Nosy Crow has become very popular and successful in recent years. What are some of the factors that you would attribute this to?

I think our size and independence are important: being small means that we’re able to act and make decisions quickly, and being independent not only allows us to experiment with new ideas, but also means that we have to absolutely believe in every book and app that we publish. Most importantly, we work with absolutely amazing authors and illustrators to make incredible books.

To read more of the interview, head over to Stephanie’s blog: Words are my Craft.