Leadership Wisdom
for the Greater Good
Do you have a lifetime of wisdom worth passing on?
Council House Press welcomes conversations with experienced leaders, practitioners, educators, and changemakers whose lived experience has something meaningful to teach the next generation.
Council House Press is emerging because we know leadership is not abstract—it is lived, relational, and deeply human. In a world shaped by uncertainty, polarization, and rapid change, we believe leadership requires more than tools and tactics. It requires meaning, belonging, and the capacity to hold both light and shadow.
Our nonfiction books support leaders, practitioners, and changemakers as they navigate complexity with clarity, courage, and care. Grounded in lived experience and thoughtful practice, they do not offer easy answers or rigid frameworks. Instead, they invite leaders into reflection, responsibility, and renewal—so they can lead in ways that sustain people, communities, and purpose over time.
What We Publish
Council House Press publishes nonfiction rooted in the lived experience of leadership, service, and meaningful work. We are especially interested in books that bring hard-won wisdom from the field into conversation with the challenges leaders face today.
Our books may emerge from careers in education, public service, nonprofit and community leadership, healthcare, business, ministry, or other forms of professional practice. They may take the form of memoir, reflective leadership, essays, or practical wisdom—but they share a commitment to something larger than individual success.
We are drawn to authors who ask more than, “How do we lead?” These authors ask, “What kind of human beings must we become to lead well?”
Explore Publishing With Us
Leadership
✳︎
Service
✳︎
Wisdom
✳︎
Courage
✳︎
Community
✳︎
Meaning
✳︎
Responsibility
✳︎
Legacy
✳︎
Leadership ✳︎ Service ✳︎ Wisdom ✳︎ Courage ✳︎ Community ✳︎ Meaning ✳︎ Responsibility ✳︎ Legacy ✳︎
Council House Press Books
The Heart Behind the Badge
What does it truly mean to serve a community?
Drawing on more than twenty-five years in law enforcement, James F. Ford, Jr., shares the memorable calls, everyday encounters, and hard-earned lessons that shaped his career as a small-town police officer. Some stories are humorous, others heartbreaking—but each reveals a side of policing rarely seen in headlines or television dramas.
At the heart of these reflections are the people in Jim’s community: families in crisis, neighbors in need, fellow officers, local business owners, and the residents who trusted him to help keep them safe. Through stories of leadership, compassion, and service, Jim offers an authentic look at the human being behind the uniform.
The Heart Behind the Badge is a warm and candid tribute to community policing—and to the quiet, often unseen work of those called to serve.
lessons from a career in community policing
By James FordFrom Badge to Blackboard
lessons from a career in criminal justice education
By James Ford PhDHow do we inspire the next generation to serve?
After more than twenty-five years in law enforcement, James F. Ford, Jr., PhD, accepted a new assignment: preparing the next generation of criminal justice professionals.
Beginning as an adjunct professor while still serving as a police lieutenant, Jim soon discovered that the classroom felt like a natural extension of his life’s work. Over the next twenty-two years, he earned his doctorate, inspired hundreds of students, developed academic programs, mentored students and faculty, and learned to navigate the very different world of higher education.
With candor, humor, and a practitioner’s perspective, Jim reflects on teaching, leadership, institutional culture, and the value of connecting academics with real-world experience. His transition began with a simple suggestion from his daughter and grew into a second fulfilling career.
From Badge to Blackboard is the story of experience transformed into wisdom—and service carried forward through teaching.
Wild Wanders
photo safaris for curious kids
by Gretchen Martens
Coming June 2027
Wild Wanders invites children to put down the screen, step outside, and discover what happens when they really begin to look.
Built around playful photo safaris, the book uses photography as a doorway into curiosity, observation, patience, and connection with the living world. Children are encouraged not simply to take pictures, but to notice: patterns and colors, tiny details, changing light, signs of other creatures, and the stories unfolding in ordinary places.
At its heart, Wild Wanders is a book about learning to pay attention.
That capacity matters far beyond photography. Observation helps children understand context. Curiosity teaches them to ask better questions. Patience allows them to see what they might otherwise miss. Attention builds relationship with place. And learning to care about what they notice is one of the beginnings of stewardship.
In a world increasingly shaped by screens, speed, and distraction, Wild Wanders offers children another way of encountering the world—one rooted in presence, wonder, and direct experience.
Because before children can care for their communities and their world, they first have to learn to see them.
Untying the Yellow Ribbon
transforming how veterans and communities thrive
by Gretchen Martens
Untying the Yellow Ribbon offers a community-centered approach to welcoming Service Members, Veterans, and military families home from war. Rather than viewing returning Veterans primarily through the lens of need, Gretchen Martens invites us to recognize the leadership, service, resilience, and experience they bring back to our communities.
At its heart, the book asks a larger question: What would become possible if communities reclaimed their responsibility—and their capacity—to care for their own? Part call to action and part exploration of citizenship, leadership, and belonging, Untying the Yellow Ribbon challenges us to move beyond “Thank you for your service” toward meaningful participation in the work of coming home.
First published in 2013 as Village of Care Press’s inaugural book; now part of the Council House Press imprint.