Author Guidelines
Submissions Windows
We welcome submissions of complete scholarly articles (for publication in Volume 4) between January 2026 – February 2026 (exact dates tbc).
We welcome submissions of proposals for Conference Papers between Jun 2025 – Aug 2025 (exact dates tbc).
Please do not send material outside these windows as it will be rejected.
What We Are Looking For - Scholarly Articles
Leaf Journal seeks to publish articles in the English language which fall within our aims and scope. Namely, articles on writing for children which are practice-based, or practice-led, or articles where the study of children’s literature has a clear writerly application. Put simply, we mean that if, while writing or reading books for young people, you have noticed something which would be useful for other creative writers, you might decide to share that ‘something’ by writing a piece for us.
We do not accept articles which fall more comfortably under English Literature's purview. You should read a few of our published articles to see what sort of content we are interested in.
Word Counts
We publish articles between 2000-5000 words, excluding Bibliography, including references and quotations.
What Happens Once You Send Us Your Work?
Every submission will be ‘triaged’ by the Managing Editors to ensure it falls within the remit of the journal. If it does, we will forward your article to two reviewers. We operate an identity-hidden peer review system. This means that we ask for submissions to be anonymised. At submission stage, please do not include your name in the article and redact any identifying information (such as the title of your own published novels). Once the reviewers have read the article, they will make one of three recommendations to the Managing Editors: offer publication, revise-and-resubmit, or reject. The Managing Editors will consider the recommendations and make their final selection for publication. If your work is rejected, we will offer a brief overview of why that decision was made. We will do so in a way that is constructive with a view to helping you develop future work. If you are invited to revise and resubmit, we will discuss the timeline. We will always want to give you the time you need to do the best work possible in your particular circumstances. If you are offered publication, it is very likely that you will be asked to make minor edits, as it’s very rare for reviewers to have no feedback at all. Once we have all agreed that the article is in good shape, it will go through a round of copyediting and then proofreading before publication.
At no point will you learn the names of your reviewers (which is what makes it ‘identity-hidden’).
A former contributor, Zoe Marriott, shared her experience of publishing with us; it’s a very helpful account of what you might expect from the process.
Multiple Submissions
You are welcome to submit your article to other publications while it is also under consideration at Leaf Journal. However, we ask that, if you are offered publication elsewhere, you withdraw your submission with us. Equally, if we offer you publication and you accept, we ask that you withdraw your submissions elsewhere.
Style Guide
Many journals operate an in-house style guide, which sets out preferred referencing systems etc. However, at Leaf Journal we do not set out those expectations. We are happy to accept work in any well-known referencing style (Harvard, MHRA etc.). We have chosen to do this because we anticipate that many of our contributors will be Masters-level students or arts practitioners who may be returning to education after some time away. Therefore, they may be at the stage where they are renewing their familiarity with the academic conventions of their own institution and switching to a new system might be destabilising.
We do ask that your article should be internally consistent. Please stick to one referencing style and choice of spelling (e.g. -ise or -ize) throughout your submission.
We welcome articles written both in an academic tone, or in a more natural, conversational voice, as suits the writer’s own style. All quotations or paraphrasing should be properly acknowledged in the text in order to maintain scholarly rigour.
Editorial Timescales
We endeavour to inform authors of our editorial decisions within three months of the closure of our submission window.
Acceptance Rate
Typically, our acceptance rate is 75%. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean we publish 75% of articles submitted to us. This figure includes offers of ‘revise and resubmit’. Not all authors have the bandwidth or desire to revise their work, which is understandable. In those circumstances, we will discuss timelines with the author as generously as possible. We make the decision ‘Accept with minor edits’ in only around 20% of cases. We have never published an article that didn’t benefit from some edits, so you should expect to receive some suggestions from us.
A Note on Terminology
Scholarly Article: When we say ‘Article’ we mean a written essay-style piece, which conforms to scholarly norms in terms of referencing, bibliography and so forth. Any Scholarly Article we publish will have been subject to Peer Review.
Abstract: An approx 200-word summary of an article including all its key points.
Keywords: Terms that might be used to discover your article in a library search. When suggesting keywords, think about the main topic of your article.
Conference Paper: When we say ‘Conference Paper’ we mean an oral presentation of your ideas. In our case, this will be pre-recorded and shared with Conference Delegates.
Conference Proceedings: Following the conference, we sometimes publish the written transcript of the Papers as ‘Conference Proceedings’. These will be lightly edited in-house, with the addition of any necessary references and a bibliography. They will not have been subject to Peer Review.
Symposium Proceedings: A Symposium is similar to a conference, but is typically smaller and perhaps has a narrower focus. Occasionally, we will publish ‘Symposium Proceedings’ which follow the same editorial workflow as ‘Conference Proceedings’ (above).
Project Proceedings: Occasionally, we will publish the proceedings of a project or event which is of direct relevance to the Aims and Scope of the journal. These follow the same editorial workflow as ‘Conference Proceedings’ (above).
