Christian Retailing

Tyndale’s children’s classics get a new lease on life Print Email
Written by Karen Schmidt   
Monday, 09 February 2009 03:20 PM America/New_York

Two longstanding favorite children’s Bible storybooks are being united in a new volume intended to bring Jesus close to kids of a new generation. Classic Bible Storybook (978-1-414-30769-5, $12.99), a collection of stories from two of Kenneth N. Taylor’s previous Bible storybooks, will be published in March by Tyndale Kids.
The Living Bible Storybook, published in 1970, and Taylor’s Bible Storybook, published in 1973—with more than 341,000 copies in print between the two, though no longer available—were culled for the 120 stories in the new book.

Inside the 350-page volume, parents and kids through age 8 will find one- and two-page stories illustrated with the original artwork by Richard and Frances Hook. Tyndale decided to use the same illustrations because Taylor was said to love their realistic portrayal of Bible characters and their tender caring portraits of children.

The Hooks’ work was originally created for a book called Taylor’s Bible Storybook, and from that collection—originals of which hang on the walls throughout Tyndale’s headquarters—the publisher has used the illustrations in many different products. One such product was the Children’s Living Bible, which used Hook art as inserted color pages.

Taylor wrote 20 children’s books and is best-known as the creator of The Living Bible; he was also founder of Tyndale House Publishers. He began the publishing business after paraphrasing the New Testament epistles to help his own 10 children more easily understand the Scriptures.

To order the Classic Bible Storybook, contact Tyndale House Publishers at 800-323-9400 or visit www.tyndale.com/kids.