Simple, Generous, Open: Mission and renewal in the progressive church by Charlotte Gale (Canterbury Press, £13.99 (Church Times SPECIAL OFFER PRICE £11.19); 978-1-78622-625-9).

“This is the engaging story of how an idea for a new church community, rooted in the central tradition of the Church of England, became a reality, and seven years later is a self-sustaining, thriving community and shop, resourcing churches all over the country and beyond.”

The Monastic world: A 1,200-year history by Andrew Jotischky (Yale, £25 (£22.50); 978-0-300-20856-6).

“Andrew Jotischky traces the history of monastic life from its origins in the fourth century to the sixteenth. He shows how religious houses sheltered the poor and elderly, cared for the sick, and educated the young. They were centres of intellectual life that owned property and exercised power but also gave rise to new developments in theology, music, and art.”

A Joyful Noise: Some authors, their times and their hymns by Charles Moseley (DLT, £16.99 (£15.29); 978-1-915412-15-7).

“Singing is a very important human activity, argues Charles Moseley. It is about bonding, about a sense of shared community, as we see in modern football crowds or in the marching songs of armies. . . A Joyful Noise is an enlightening and informative introduction to some of the greatest hymn writers of the Christian tradition including: Charles Wesley, Aquinas, Prudentius, Christopher Wordsworth, Mrs Cecil Frances Alexander and Robert Bridges.”

Selected by Frank Nugent, of the Church House Bookshop, which operates the Church Times Bookshop.