Grove booklets are a great vehicle for new authors—but we also work with established authors and 'big names'—and everyone in between.
If you would like to write for Grove, the first thing to do is to submit a proposal. This will be sent to the relevant editorial group who will consider whether it fits within the series. If they would like to take it further, they will be in touch, and might want to invite you to one of their meetings to discuss it with you.
Please complete the attached Proposal Form and email it to sales@grovebooks.co.uk
As you start to work on your text, you will need to refer to the Author Guidelines. These tell you everything you need to know about writing a booklet for Grove Books, including the process of interaction with your series editorial group.
Once you have completed your writing, and agreed your final text with the series editorial group, the Author Checklist tells you everything that we will need from you prior to printing.
The Memorandum of Agreement below is the formal document that needs to be signed when your text goes for publication.
When you have submitted the text and the other items on the checklist, now is the time to start thinking about promoting your booklet
Each Grove series has a particular approach and 'angle'. The following may help you to understand where your text might fit and how to shape it for a particular series.
Biblical
The Grove Biblical series seeks to bring evangelical biblical scholarship to a wide audience in order to serve the ministry of the church. We publish texts by both well-known and new authors which cover guides to individual books of the Bible as well as in-depth studies of particular issues. We aim to keep a balance of texts about Old and New Testaments as well as address contemporary issues by asking what the Bible has to say about them. Occasionally we publish a summary of an author’s major work in order to make it accessible to readers, clergy and others who teach and preach in the church as well as those seeking to grow in their discipleship.
Discipleship
Titles in this series seek to stimulate creative reflection on Christian discipleship as a distinct way of looking at every aspect of Christian living in contemporary society. Living ‘The Way’ of Jesus (‘Jesus-shaped lives’) has implications for the making of new disciples, the catechesis of the newly discipled, discipleship in the home, at work or leisure, in worship, and in many other ways.
The series is designed to help lay and ordained church leaders engage with the challenges and opportunities for discipleship and disciple-making within the rich diversity of our contemporary world. We welcome texts which demonstrate creativity and innovation and which will help readers explore new possibilities. We particularly look for texts which come out of praxis and grounded engagement, which demonstrate a clear understanding of context, and which offer theological reflection and wider practical application. Titles will encourage a holistic understanding of living ‘The way’ of Jesus in contemporary contexts in the UK, informed by the wider international community of faith.
The series seeks to respond to the call of the Anglican Communion for a refocusing on ‘Intentional Discipleship and Disciple-Making’ and dovetails with the approach of the CofE’s 2017 report ‘Setting God’s People Free’ and the subsequent Everyday Faith resources and the wider revival of interest in discipleship within the Roman Catholic Church, World Council of Churches, World Evangelical Alliance and other global Christian communities.
It is produced in collaboration with the Anglican Consultative Council.
Doctrine
Grove Doctrine Series aims to offer accessible ways into the key doctrinal questions and concerns facing churches in the UK and beyond. Booklets are written to enable Christians to think through doctrine in ways that are meaningful to their lives today. The series covers a wide range of approaches to doctrine, such as:
- Why a particular doctrine matters for the life of the Church
- Thinking doctrinally through an aspect of the Christian life (e.g. prayer, providence)
- Exploring how the history of doctrinal theology can speak to the contemporary church context
- Asking what it means think doctrinally today
- Analyses of Christian beliefs
Education
Titles in the Grove Education series aim to provide, develop and support Christian reflection and best practice in education. They are rooted primarily in schools, academies and colleges, with some reflection from practice in further and higher education. The series offers both practical approaches and thought-provoking, accessible understanding from a Christian perspective. The Series also aims to make a positive contribution to the importance of education in Christian mission.
Some books in the series specifically focus on Church of England schools and academies, whilst others relate to wider educational matters.
The Education Series is sponsored by the Association of Anglican Directors of Education; consequently the books are used in every diocese in England and Wales. Readers include teachers, headteachers, those engaged in school governance, diocesan education officers, clergy, church members and parents.
Ethics
The Grove Ethics series aims to produce booklets that are stimulating, up-to-date, critical and practical for Christians living in society today. They focus on topics across the ethical spectrum. This will include issues in applied ethics, such as medical, sexual, political, environmental and business ethics. The series also includes booklets that focus on more methodological areas that provide a foundation for our ethical thinking, especially in terms of biblical ethics, as well as booklets on individual thinkers or movements that offer a more systematic approach to ethics as a whole. Booklets may also offer a more historical approach, but always with an eye to Christian living today.
Although many of the booklets address issues being faced within the Anglican Church, the series is intended to provide a resource for the wider church in the UK, US, and further afield. The aim of the series is to encourage and inform both ministers and laity, to provide an invaluable resource in a constantly shifting battlefield of ethical demands, and to respond to these ever changing needs.
Mission and Evangelism
Titles in this series seek to capture and make available current thinking and practice in mission and evangelism in the UK. The majority of our texts are written from the experience of practitioners although we occasionally produce titles which provide a commentary on contemporary documents or summarise current thinking.
The series is designed to help church leaders engage with the challenges and opportunities for mission and evangelism within the rich diversity of the UK context. We welcome texts which demonstrate creativity and innovation and which will help readers explore new possibilities for mission and evangelism with the UK’s changing social and cultural landscape. We particularly look for texts which come out of praxis and grounded engagement, which demonstrate a clear understanding of context, and which offer theological reflection and wider practical application. The church in the UK is culturally diverse and we seek to assist the church in learning from the distinct gifts in mission that come from that diversity.
The series is sponsored by the Church Mission Society
Pastoral
The Grove Pastoral series focuses on issues relevant both to church communities and to wider society. A glance through our past publications reveals the very wide range of topics and approaches. Books need to be earthed in real life with applicability to our current church and social contexts.
We seek to offer a penetrating insight into the nature of pressing contemporary pastoral questions and opportunities, as well as offering a range of skills and tools with which Christians, both lay and ordained, can engage sensitively with these.
Proposals ideally combine practical engagement and pastoral reality with theological awareness and rigour, neither ‘purely’ academic theology nor simply ‘how-to’ books. The best ones are usually clear, concise, thoughtful, well-focused and say something fresh.
Spirituality
The Grove Spirituality Series, rooted in the Evangelical tradition, explores the breadth and depth of Christian spirituality, both past and present. We expound on Christian spirituality by drawing on wisdom from the broad church, aiming to make the spiritual riches of other Christian traditions accessible to Evangelicals; we seek to encourage Evangelical Christians to grow deeper in their relationship with Jesus Christ by encountering afresh aspects of Christian spirituality that stem from a long tradition.
We provide renewed resources for the spiritual journey. Our booklets aim to address the holistic nature of Christian spirituality in ways that are relevant, timely and contemporary. We emphasize the importance and significance of spiritual development by exploring Christian spirituality from various approaches such as: historical, biblical, practical, individual, communal, emotional, experiential, intellectual, theological, pedagogical, cultural, contextual (et al; this is not an exhaustive list), in order to encourage growth in both grace and knowledge. Our booklets are intended to stimulate desire for deepening a life of prayer, and all of our authors should consider the question ‘how can I pray with this booklet’?
Worship
The Grove Worship series explores current issues in Christian worship, sometimes focusing on the Church of England and sometimes looking at worship more broadly. We often provide commentary or guidance on using the C of E's official resources, but also include critique of those resources, or suggestions for different approaches. Our starting point is Evangelical perspectives, concerns and assumptions, but we aim to produce material which is useful for the whole church. Our primary target readership is leaders of worship, lay and ordained (including musicians), but we also aim for our booklets to be accessible for other decision-makers and worshippers in the church. We seek to publish material which is biblically and theologically rich, but always practically focused.
Youth
The Grove Youth series welcomes proposals on any aspect of mission or ministry with young people and we are willing to consider the occasional booklet on a topic which interfaces with youth such as family or children. We particularly value booklets from practitioners and can support new authors to communicate their ideas and experience. We look for our booklets to be accessible, inspirational, transferable to other contexts, drawing on an evidence base and illustrated with stories or case studies from a range of settings. We run an annual writing day for potential authors—email mcym@stjohns-nottm.ac.uk for details.