Cambridge ESV Pitt Minion Update: Brown Goatskin and More

Last week, I shared some details about Cambridge's upcoming editions of the English Standard Version, thanks to David Dewey, who chatted with the folks from Cambridge at the Christian Resources Exhibition. The discussion afterward raised some questions, and Brian Vos, the director of Bibles and E-commerce for Baker Publishing Group, which distributes Cambridge Bibles in the US, offered some extra details and a correction. Here's what he said (with emphasis added by me):

The ESV Pitt Minion will be available in brown goatskin with black-letter text, rather than calfskin as noted in the entry. Based on the comments, this will be welcome news. And the July or August date is when the Pitt Minion will release in the UK, but the official release date in the US is October. We will ship them as soon as we have them in the US, but there is a significant shipping time to consider. The four editions will be black goatskin with red letter, brown goatskin with black letter, burgundy French Morocco with red letter, and two-tone tan/burgundy with black letter text. The goatskin editions will have art-gilt edges.

Naturally, I'm lining up for the brown goatskin, and will post lots of photos once I get it. Special thanks to Brian for sharing the good news.

J. Mark Bertrand is a novelist and pastor whose writing on Bible design has helped spark a publishing revolution. Mark is the author of Rethinking Worldview: Learning to Think, Live, and Speak in This World (Crossway, 2007), as well as the novels Back on Murder, Pattern of Wounds, and Nothing to Hide—described as a “series worth getting attached to” (Christianity Today) by “a major crime fiction talent” (Weekly Standard) in the vein of Michael Connelly, Ian Rankin, and Henning Mankell.

Mark has a BA in English Literature from Union University, an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Houston, and an M.Div. from Heidelberg Theological Seminary. Through his influential Bible Design Blog, Mark has championed a new generation of readable Bibles. He is a founding member of the steering committee of the Society of Bible Craftsmanship, and chairs the Society’s Award Committee. His work was featured in the November 2021 issue of FaithLife’s Bible Study Magazine.

Mark also serves on the board of Worldview Academy, where he has been a member of the faculty of theology since 2003. Since 2017, he has been an ordained teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America. He and his wife Laurie life in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.