The NLT Art of Life Bible is a beautiful new addition to Tyndale’s Bible lineup produced with the help of 2K/Denmark. With easy to read text and 450 hand-drawn illustrations it invites you to meditate on God and his Word by considering the variety of life he has created.
ISBN: 9781496437839 Printed in China
Tyndale provided this Bible in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to give a positive review, only an honest one. All opinions are my own.
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This Bible is available at (includes some affiliate links)
and many local Bible bookstores
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Table of Contents
Video Review
Construction and Materials
It has a teal blue cloth over board cover with gold lettering on the front and spine and one matching teal ribbon bookmark attached. Slightly wider than it is tall, it measures 9″ x 9 1/2″ x 1 3/4″ and weighs 4 pounds.
It has coordinating endpapers with a watercolor effect in various shades of blue-green and a little gold.
It has smooth white pages that we are guessing to be in the upper 30s gsm. They are very easy to turn. We did notice that the size of the Bible made the pages more likely to droop when held at an angle. This could make the pages crinkle if you aren’t careful as you close them. This doesn’t seem to be a problem when used flat on a table or desk and it was probably intended to be used instead of holding it up.
The included slipcase is very thick cardboard coated in white with gold accents and an illustration of a tree on the front. The much thinner cardboard band coordinates nicely but I’d remove it at home to show off the slipcase art.
Typography and Layout
The Art of Life Bible is laid out in two-column paragraph format. Poetry is set in stanzas and quotes are offset. Each column of text is just over 3″ wide. The book name and main chapter number are centered over the Biblical text in the header and the page number is centered under the text in the footer.
The inner margin is about 7/8″ wide and the outer margin is just under 2″ wide.
The main font is a 10 point font. 5 lines of text and almost 5 spaces between the lines fit in the height of a penny. It is all black letter and the ink darkness seems to be very consistent. The chapter numbers are as tall as two lines of text and have a hand-drawn shaded appearance.
A second shade of ink, a teal or turquoise blue, is used for the section headings, headers, and footers. It is also used for the titles of the drawings and well as the verse references and more information labels found in the illustration captions. It coordinates well with the cover and also seems to stay a consistent color throughout the Bible.
Footnotes are standard NLT translation notes and have a smaller text. They are placed at the bottom of the right-hand column on any page containing them. An asterisk within the text indicates a footnote and bold verse numbers indicate which verse each note is for.
This is a very nice, easy-to-read layout if you don’t mind a large Bible.
Illustrations
Artwork
There are beautiful copies of hand drawings of the
plants,
animals,
and people of the Bible.
Over 450 illustrations ranging in size from tiny drawings at the beginning and end of each book to a handful of panoramic two-page illustrations are included.
All the artwork was done by artist Dina Danosa over the course of 4 years. A few more examples of the artwork can be found on Tyndale’s website along with an article to download from 2K/Denmark with information about their involvement in the development of this Bible and more information about the artist.
Captions
The 450 main illustrations all have captions.
The captions for the plants and animals include the scientific name and a reference for the nearby verse that mentions it. Besides basic information, the notes sometimes include details about the Hebrew names of things and/or their cultural and Biblical significance.
The captions for the “portraits” of people include the definition of their name and a reference for a nearby passage that includes them. A brief synopsis of their life makes up the main portion of the caption. If they are mentioned more than once a complete list of where to read their story in the Bible. Sometimes a lesson we can learn from their life is included.
Indexes
Three separate indexes (People, Plant, and Animal) of the artwork are included in the back of the Bible.
There are also a dozen lined pages in the back that could be used for journaling, or to create an index of your own work throughout the rest of the Bible.
I love these illustrations. They are beautifully done and help encourage you to keep going back to this Bible. I think the captions are well done also. They give you enough information to make Biblical people and times more real without being so in-depth they would overwhelm new Bible readers.
I’m torn between leaving this Bible exactly like it comes and setting it out for visitors (and my family) to look through or putting it with my larger journaling Bibles to start writing in. Maybe something halfway in-between. Putting only a few less personal journaling entries into it and coloring a few pictures with colored pencil fairly realistically and leaving it out for others to see and use.
Final Thoughts on the NLT Art of Life Bible
The NLT Art of Life Bible is beautiful. The multiple illustrations, interesting notes, and wide margins would make this a very nice “at home” devotional or journaling Bible. Its large size and inviting layouts would make it a great alternative to a large family Bible as a coffee table book that starts discussions and encourages you to read your Bible.
_________________________________________________________
This Bible is available at (includes some affiliate links)
and many local Bible bookstores
_________________________________________________________
Photography by Lucinda Brown
Tyndale provided this Bible in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to give a positive review, only an honest one. All opinions are my own.
This is really rather lovely. It’s set me off wondering why more Bibles don’t have pictures in them (and when they do, they look like ’90s Powerpoint presentations!) because this is quite charming and I think changes the mood a little, in a good way. Thanks for this review, I would’ve never known about it if I hadn’t stopped to graze here for a while!
So glad the review was helpful. One of the things I love about modern Bible publishing is that there is such a wide variety of Bibles available. Lots of different features and styles to match different uses and different personalities of the users.