Welcome to the world of the Garden Knight
This is the homepage for The Garden Knight, a heroic fantasy-adventure series by Justin Greer. Please feel free to follow the links below to purchase the books, learn more about the author, and see progress on various projects. Don't forget to join the mailing list on the Contact tab and receive a free prequel novella!
Purchase the Books
Welcome! I'm glad you've found your way here. The Garden Knight is a series of fantasy-adventure stories about Derry Melyvante, a gardener in a remote mountain village who finds himself frequently pulled into adventure, intrigue, mystery, and more alongside his faithful dog Barrow and a host of friends and allies. Join Derry as he battles monsters, uncovers foul plots, investigates strange and aberrant plants, explores ruins and temples, and adventures his way through imperiled lands — all in an effort to get back home to his gardens.Please click on the images below to purchase the novels on Amazon in ebook and paperback formats.
About the Author
My name is Justin Greer. I was born in Provo, Utah, and currently live in Salt Lake City, Utah, though in between I have spent significant time in Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Wales. I've been writing stories for most of my life, starting with a yellow legal pad at age 10 when I first learned it was possible to write stories like the ones I loved. Over the years, my love for fantasy, adventure, science fiction, and horror has deepened and broadened, culminating in publishing my own stories for the world to read. I hope you'll enjoy reading The Garden Knight stories as much as I've loved writing them. There are many more adventures forthcoming.My favorite writers include JRR Tolkien, Terry Brooks, David Gemmell, James Clemens/Rollins, Kate Forsyth, Brandon Sanderson, Steven Erikson, Tim Akers, Poul Anderson, Bradley P. Beaulieu, Terry Pratchett, Italo Calvino, Katharine Kerr, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Brian Lumley, and Tad Williams. You can see the influence of most of these writers in my stories.I'm also a big fan of music (pop-punk, Celtic, symphonic metal, synthpop, folk), movies (action, thriller, SFF, noir, comedy), videogames (The Legend of Zelda, Bravely Default, Valkyrie Profile, Final Fantasy, Skyrim, FromSoft, Kingdom Hearts, any Mario platformer), board & card games, Icelandic sagas, tabletop RPGs, and mythology. Many of these things also make their presence known in my fiction.Beyond writing, I'm a father of two fantastic boys and a husband to a wonderful wife. I spend my time reading, exercising, taking long walks, traveling, cooking, studying languages, and working as a freelance editor.
Contact
I'd love to hear from you! Please feel free to reach out with questions, comments, speculation, whatever. If you just want to chat about videogames or music or something, that's cool too.You can find me on Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit by clicking the icons below, as well as via email, which is probably the easiest way to get my attention directly [justin@thegardenknight.com].Most importantly: I have a mailing list, and it comes with a free story! Below, you can sign up to receive my newsletter (no spam, just updates about my writing), and as a free perk you'll receive the first tale of The Garden Knight, a special novella called Leafdust & Deadwood that serves as the proper introduction to Derry and Barrow prior to the events of Tangleweed & Waterbloom. This is a must-read for fans of the series — and a great way to try out my stories and see if they're for you.Happy reading, and welcome aboard!
Blog
Welcome PostWelcome to this corner of my website, where I can say whatever I want without any editorial oversight!
Post: April 14, 2024Welcome!I'm excited to report that everything has been finalized for the publication of Tangleweed & Waterbloom on April 19. Now I can just sit back and let the laurels pile up!. . . Kind of. I'm definitely enjoying the fact that all the prep work is done. I'm also super excited to see this book out in the world. But in the meantime, I'm hard at work on writing. Wouldn't really have it any other way, of course.For Tangleweed, I'm working on some maps using Inkarnate. For now, I'll be hosting these on the site, but I do plan to eventually also include them in the published books once I have the time to finalize them properly. I'm starting with a map of Haverdell and a map of the eastern provinces of Ambarax, which will cover the events of 0.5, 1, and 1.5, but after that I'll expand to create maps of Ambarax, Ambarax and the surrounding countries, the western half of the continent . . . and then beyond!As for other projects, my main focus for right now is Garden Knight 3. The first draft is about halfway done and is going really well. In the queue I also have a middle grade fantasy adventure story and book 3 of an epic fantasy series, both of which I'm hoping to finish this year; the revision of book 2 of that series; and a variety of short stories in progress that I would like to get back to. I hope all of these will see the light of day eventually, though for now the focus will continue to be The Garden Knight.And that's all from me for now!—JAG
Post: March 9, 2024Well, Leafdust is live, Tangleweed is up for preorder, and I'm starting the social media post rollout now! Super exciting!I'll be back for a proper welcome post soon.—JAG
Post: March 7, 2024I've uploaded the files to Amazon for Leafdust & Deadwood in both paperback and ebook formats. Just waiting for their reviews to be complete and then I get to post about it! The preorder for Tangleweed is also under review. Hoping for tomorrow—it's exciting to be at this stage.—JAG
Post: March 5, 2024Well, this is the inaugural post! Wow!It's a shame I don't have anything pithier to say, really. Right now I'm working on finalizing cover art for Tangleweed so that I can initiate the preorder and then publish Leafdust. It's a really exciting time, honestly. I'll probably do a proper Welcome to the Blog post at some point when people are actually reading this, but for now, it's nice to just acknowledge that things are starting to come together and it's really exciting to be getting ready to put my writing out into the world.If you stumble upon this post: Stay tuned, I guess! I'll have lots more coming soon.—JAG
The World of the Garden Knight
This is where I'll post extra content from The Garden Knight, including maps, Q&As, lore, playlists, character bios, etc.Feel free to let me know what you'd like to see! I'll basically just use whatever time I have to provide as much interesting information as I know I'd like to see about my favorite stories, so I'm happy to oblige requests.
I almost always listen to music while I write. It helps me focus and tune the world out. Years ago, I started curating specific playlists for individual books (in addition to the general "writing playlist" I use, which is like 1,500 songs at this point). I wanted to cultivate a particular feel for a particular book, so I channeled the inspiration of songs that gave me the right vibe.Well, that practice grew over the years, and I started creating playlists prior to beginning a story, selecting songs that already reminded me of characters and plots I planned to write. This has helped me worldbuild and outline, but it's also had the magical effect of allowing me to instantly get into the right headspace when I work on a particular novel. Even if I've set it aside for months, all I need to do is hit play on the right playlist and I'm instantly transported into the appropriate mindset.With that in mind, I want to share some of these playlists as I publish different stories. I'm starting with the official playlist for Tangleweed & Waterbloom, which is embedded below. Have a listen, and do let me know what songs you like!
Projects & Progress
This is where you can see the various projects I'm working on and their status. Hopefully soon this'll have cool charts and such; for now, text will have to do!The Garden Knight#0.5: Leafdust & Deadwood: Published in ebook and paperback on March 8, 2024!#1: Tangleweed & Waterbloom: Published in ebook and paperback on April 19, 2024!#1.5: Splinterleaf & Hollowfrost: first draft complete, beta reader feedback underway, expected to publish in autumn of 2024.#2: [title to be revealed]: currently undergoing beta reader feedback, expected to publish in spring of 2025.#2.5: [title to be revealed]: first draft completed, awaiting beta reader feedback in late 2024, expected to publish in autumn of 2025.#3: [title to be revealed]: currently working on the first draft! As of May 7, 2024, I'm at 43,000 words, so about halfway - this will be the longest Garden Knight book to date.The Prophecy of the Five#1: [title to be revealed]: all drafting completed. Work for publication will begin late 2024, including cover art commission, layout and typesetting, final edit and proofread, and title/cover/plot reveal rollout. Expected to publish in summer of 2025.updated 5/7/24