The Beginner’s Guide to Growing Great Vegetables

The Beginner's Guide to Growing Great Vegetables is an absolute must have. I took so many notes from this book that I need my own copy. There are tips and suggestions for every month, things you should do for your garden based on the zone you reside in. The book also has beautiful full color photos and simple instructions to follow. I recommend this as a gardening bible to follow every year.

Such an excellent gardening guide. This is perfect for anyone exploring their own gardening practices!

This book could be used for lessons in reading, science, math, and writing. I really think this would be a good book for older students who are learning to read. The book has sections for gardening by the month but also information about different vegetables. This would be a great activity to do in the classroom and have students read the instructions. The book also encourages keeping a gardening journal which would help the students with writing. This would be a great book for the school library or as a classroom resourc.e

This is a great starter book for those who want to start with a small garden and then expand. The step by step, month by month directions, tips and suggestions are very well written and are easy to follow. Illustrations and photographs add to the overall aesthetic of the book and help the reader to learn alternate ways to start their very own garden.

This is a good basic introduction to gardening. It is well laid out with nice pictures. I found the suggestion to journal what happens in the garden and monthly "things to do" guides good suggestions. I wish it had a little more detail about what to do when you see problems or how to recognize when to harvest. For example, the carrots section tells you how to pull them out but now how to tell if those are ready which is what I have a problem with. I also have a problem with my squash flowering, but not producing the squash. I would recommend this for a first time gardener to get them started.

The Beginner's guide to growing great vegetables is an amazing resource. I have been a gardener for five decades and I found I had much to learn from this book so the word beginner's guide may not really apply. It needs to be on each gardeners' book shelf for reference during the year. I loved the month by month breakdown of tasks and the helpful hints of what to plant together and ways to jumpstart the growing seasons. The shelf life of individual vegetable seeds and troubleshooting soil and watering issues was another topic covered in this resource. I would love to have this as my own personal gardening resource and to give as a gift to fellow gardeners.

As an educator, I would recommend this book as a guide to my students and for teachers who needs inspiration and guidance in how to get their own school gardens growing. Beginning gardeners will learn about hardiness zones, when and how to plant, will begin to notice the nuances of weather and seasons, and come to recognize the wild flora and fauna who live in their backyards. Whether you want to nibble fresh microgreens in the middle of winter, build a worm bin, or set up a hoop house/greenhouse, Lorene has solid advice and encouragement for you. In addition to the information rich month-by-month planner, the A-Z Almanac will be an oft-visited resource. This Garden Guide would be a welcomed gift for new homeowners.

A must have reference book for the home gardener. I loved how the book was laid out. The chapters detail what to do when by each month and region of the country. Lots of tips and how tos, even for the seasoned gardener. Pleasing illustrations.. Well thought out book.

I enjoyed this instructional book to help further my understanding of gardening and to help plan out the gardening year. It strengthened my knowledge of what to expect when and tips on how I can better grow my veggies.

This was a wonderful, detailed look at what it takes to grow vegetables. As an aspiring gardener (with a very brown thumb) I am encouraged to give it another try, following the advice of this book!

The Beginner's Guide to Growing Great Vegetables is an informative book about how to have a successful garden. The book is broken down into sections for every aspect of gardening, such as planning your garden, soil composition, how and when to plant different categories of vegetables, yearly rotation of crops, and harvesting so that you can have fresh crops throughout the season instead of all at once. This book is for anyone interested in starting a garden. Whether you have large field plots for planting, or a small area on a deck or balcony, this will guide you for how to grow a successful garden.
Thank you to #NetGalley for an ARC of this book. I am looking forward to attempting my first small potted garden this year and feel that I now have the knowledge now to do it!

This is an excellent gardening resource! It lays a wonderful foundation by first explaining that "the best thing you can do is to develop an understanding of the climate and a "feel" for the weather of your growing region." I had never thought about the fact that which part of the region you would live in would affect your garden. I live in the Southeast, so of note to me was, "Gardening is a year-round activity in this region, and abundant rainfall makes for verdant growth." The author has wonderful advice like this for each region. She also includes a beginner's guide glossary, outlining common gardening terms and what they mean. For someone like me who has never done a garden, only taken care of plants, this is very eye-opening information. I never knew so much was required to do a garden.
Another topic the author covers is cool-season crops, warm-season crops, and even doing a crop rotation.
From the beautiful illustrations, the in-depth knowledge of gardening, including what to plant when, this is a must-have for the novice gardener, to the most advanced gardener. It will be a resource that you consult again and again.
Thank you to Net Galley and the publisher for the opportunity to review this book. I was not required to give a positive review but was happy to do so. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Enjoy this book on gardening. I am beginning my first garden so I am thankful for books out there to help me get started. I have so much to learn. The photos are beautiful and the information was very valuable to me.
Thanks for the advanced copy.

My mother was a gardener and my grandmother before her. I grew up with an acre of ploughed dirt where I spent countless hours planting, weeding and harvesting. When I found myself with a south-facing apartment, I couldn't wait to start a bunch of container gardens and get back to enjoying fresh produce! Unfortunately, although Mother and Grandma made it look easy, there's a lot more to gardening than just sticking seeds in the dirt, which is where this book comes to the rescue. Although I was occasionally disappointed by the generalizations, I realize that if Lorene Edwards Forkner had taken the time to describe every climate, potential problem or plant type, this would be more of an encyclopedia rather than a beginner's guide. I still picked up some handy tips, though, and I'm more excited than ever to test out some seeds in my window boxes... as soon as the weather cooperates. Forkner's writing style is very reminiscent of a self-help blog, which occasionally is obnoxiously optimistic and features too many keywords, but overall reading this book was a pleasant experience, and I think it's a great first step for anyone who wants to get started gardening or brush up their current skills a little.

This is a great book for those who know nothing or very little about gardening, The author gives simple step by step instructions, as well as month by month information. The guidance about gardening in different regions of the country is very useful as well. I'm looking forward to trying this out soon!

Wow! What a fantastic book. This is perfect for anyone who wants to grow vegetables, whether you are just starting out or have some level of experience. It breaks everything down, from best time to plant by region, how to test your soil, how to build a raised bed garden, month by month planting guide, what things grow well together and what doesn't, and so on. The photos are incredible and so is the artwork. It just doesn't get more comprehensive than this and I found the book to be intuitive, easy to use, and well laid out. This is one you're going to want for your library collection AND your personal collection.

What an incredible asset for any beginning gardener to have. I feel this book was just detailed enough, with wonderful monthly plans on how to manage one's garden. It covered composting, raised beds, container gardening, different plantings for different seasons, gardening zones, and was filled with great tips. An excellent book.

Advance copy given in return for an honest review

A homey book that warms up gardening advice. This was a nice way to think about gardening in a more rounded way than just dry instructions. The layout is great for a beginning gardener and the pictures go along nicely and help enhance the experience. A good start, but does not go deeply into any of the topics, so someone with experience might find this lacking in detail.

An excellent reference for first time and seasoned gardeners. The graphics are nicely descriptive and the text is well written. I would purchase this book for my personal use and keep it handy throughout the year for planning and growing.

Ok, you might be wondering why exactly I'm reading about vegetables.

I can't grow things. I'm not exaggerating. I really, really can't grow things. I adopt plants and they die. It's a fact that I know to be true yet refuse to accept. The problem is I'm really enthusiastic and would love nothing more than to grow things. I dream about having a small space outside where I can grow vegetables and other plants, but I don't have any of the knowledge needed to get started.

That's where this book comes in.

The downside of all of this is that the book is written for a North American audience, and I'm based in the UK. But considering how much the climate varies in the US, I figure some of the rules must apply. Surely. Either that or I'll just continue murdering plants. Either way, I opened this book deciding that whether I could apply the rules to England or not, I'd learn something. And I did!

What I love:

This book is written to be understood by people who do not know about gardening. This is very important if, like me, you are clueless and have absolutely no idea in which season you're supposed to plant carrots and what conditions are required for tomatoes to grow. You can read the book as a complete beginner and not want to cry.

It's not just the planting that's explained in detail. Various climates and also sun conditions are noted for you to refer to as needed. Want to know what full sun means? No problem, it's right there.

Imagine my delight to find a glossary, explaining all of those terms that many books include, assuming I know what they mean. Surprise! I don't know. But now I do. Or at least, I know where to find out what exactly they mean.

The book offers tips for people living in areas with complicated climates. This could be for geographical reasons, or because we're slowly destroying the planet. Either way, the author discusses techniques such as harvesting the rain, so that you don't burden an already strained system. Considering \I live in England; I don't think rain shortage will be a problem. But when you consider the intended audience of the book this is really valuable. It helps the reader know how to make their resources stretch further, but also offers a more environmentally conscious solution.

The structure of the book is perfect, particularly for the clueless gardener. Not only does it offer up many helpful tips, but it’s also divided into clear, useful sections, including a monthly calendar that you can use to help you figure out what to grow when.

All in all this is a very helpful book that I will refer to often, especially once I start working on my own little space outside. I'm going to have to do more research specific to the country I live in, but many of the terms used in the book will carry across, as will the general gardening tips.

I highly recommend for a beginner like myself. It doesn't go into huge amounts of detail so once you've grasped the initial concepts, you'll probably need to look elsewhere.

A very fun and informative book that will help me do more than just grow some tomatoes. You will learn how and when to start planting, how to help your soil, and the monthly actions you should take to make sure your garden will prosper. A lot of great photos.

What a nice beginner garden book! Lots of pictures. Really goes over all the basics and then expands on the themes as each chapter comes up. I thoroughly enjoyed perusing this book and would purchase it as a reference guide.

The Beginner’s Guide to Growing Great Vegetables, by Lorene Edwards Forkner, is an excellent resource for anyone looking to start a garden. It is so well written and easy to understand. I like that she breaks it down by months and regions of the country so you know exactly what you should be doing. Highly recommended this for any gardener!

Thank you to NetGalley and Timber Press for the opportunity to read this book for an honest review.

So many great tips for those just beginning, as well as those who have been working on mastering the art of gardening!

I found this book to be so helpful! Homesteading and becoming more self sustaining is a big interest of mine so I'll take what I learned from this book and it'll go a long way!

This was a really well done and thought out book. Lots of good tips, I liked the end of chapter skill sets. Great pictures and great depth of gardening knowledge was clear. I think this would be even better if there was a way to do it separately for each growing area. Would love this info for my home in Manitoba, which was not included in the charts at all, though some other parts of Canada were.

My husband and I have been gardening for 25 years, but you know what they say? “You’re never too old to learn!” That is so truly right! Not only did we learn how to make our garden better, but we actually found out why some of our garden hasn’t been producing! Can’t wait to try what we have learned this Spring!

Great photos that were inspiring. The information is solid and clearly presented. It's difficult to balance specificity with advice for all of the growing zones of the USA but Forkner managed it adroitly.

I am by far not a beginner gardener but in this book, I found some handy tips and tricks that I can use. A good book for not only beginners but for seasoned pros too.

Wow... what a cornucopia of information and a delight to get a peek at. Loved the pictures and illustrations not to mention the ideas.

What did I like? It’s interesting when you find a book that encompasses all the ideas you have for your garden. From the seasons, to rain barrels, to pests and companion planting this book holds a ton of info. This is my first year planting and I’m already overwhelmed with what should go where and when. This book does a lot of the work for you.

Would I recommend or buy? I would love a paperback copy! On my wish list! I’d recommend to a beginner planter as it’s a book to help you get your bearings. A book I badly need!

I received a complimentary copy to read and voluntarily left a review! I feel very lucky to have gotten a peek and kudos to the author for a great book!

I really loved the tips that the author has learned through lived experience. The language used is easily understood, and flows nicely in order to understand the point being made. Diagrams and pics are great! However, being Canadian, I always have issue with just a map of the U.S. for growing zones. Even though I am an experienced gardener, it is always a delight to learn a new tip, or two! Thank you for that!

I’m not a beginning gardener but I still found this book informative. It’s very well laid out with information on everything from soil amendments to a crop rotation strategy. I particularly like the monthly to do lists which are broken down by region.

This is one of the better beginning gardening books I've read this year (and I've read a lot!). It's got great information to get you started, lots of lovely stock photos, good charts, and detailed information on growing lots of kinds of veggies and understanding issues like soil, sun and fertilizer. I tend to garden a little more organically, lazily and sustainably but this one was one of the closest I've found to working for my kind of gardening. It will be a great guide for anyone starting out with veggies.

I read a temporary digital ARC of this book for review.

A good guide for beginners interested in growing vegetables. Practical and easy to use. Would be great for beginners or seasoned gardeners looking for the basics.

Beautiful photos and month-to-month guide to keep you on track to produce a fabulous, productive vegetable garden!

Great book for beginners. I showed my daughter several of the pages (who is in the beginning stages of setting up her garden) and she can hardly wait till publication to get her own copy!
We loved the step by step & month by month planner. Well written - easy to follow.

The Beginner’s Guide to Growing Great Vegetables by Lorene Edwards Forkner is an excellent guide for starting that garden you’ve been dreaming about! This is the perfect guide for the novice veggie gardener but also the perfect refresher coarse and scheduler for those with more experience. I learned so much from this book that I’m itching to get out there in my garden!

Forkner does an amazing job of organizing all the garden basics and tips in this books so they are easy to find and enjoyable to read. You are covered with a glossary, soul basics, watering, weather, tools and getting your planting areas organized.

After the introductory basics you will find a month by month guide of what to do in your garden. My favorite parts were the DIY guides for raised beds and also Lasagna beds. You will learn how to prep for the season and also how to prepare your garden beds for winter. Learn all about seeds from reading the packet on how to collect. Composting and worm bins. There is also so much information on what you may be planting from fruit, vegetables, herbs, cover crops and more. The last portion of the book is an edibles guide with beautiful photographs.

What is so lovely about Forkner’s writing is that this is an enjoyable read! Not a stuffy text book in anyway. A fresh guide to vegetable garden with all the science and know how still there. This really is have a must have guide or gift for the vegetable gardeners in your life.

This book would be an asset to any gardener's collection. I like how the book is divided into months so you know what to do in which month and then it tells you how to do those things in that specific month. It's very organized and easy to understand. The pictures were very vibrant and helped with what things should look like as you attempt them. It's also helpful that they told how the different parts of the State do things at different times of the year because not every place is the same. If I had this book in my home library, I would be taking it out all the time as a reference to help me with my gardens.

As much masters' manual as beginners' guide, this book can transform your seasonal summer hobby into a year-round and productive occupation feeding the spirit as well as family and friends. If you have space for a garden of any size from window box to yard you should have this book.

A detailed, fun to read gardening book with tons of information and beautiful pictures! I am so jazzed that I pre-ordered a copy so that I can refer back to it anytime I want.

**I received an electronic ARC from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review of this book.

Each year I plant a vegetable garden, and each year I eat precisely 5 tomatoes, and maybe a few beans, because I cannot get anything else to grow. At all. This book has given me hope that this year, our harvest will be bountiful and full of tasty treats. Following the monthly guide, I have actually begun a planner for the year, and will follow my successes and failures into following years, building on the knowledge from this book. Breaking it down into easy, organized monthly chunks allows me to focus on small successes, rather than the end game, and my five tomatoes. Thank you!

This beginners guide to gardening was great. Last year I tried to grow a bunch of stuff and it was like a Pinterest fail. Didn’t know a thing about gardening and it showed. So I was glad to get my hands on this.
This author had a fresh approach (to me) about the joy of gardening. She wrote the preface like a novel. She told me to prepare to be delight and I was!
I never even thought about keeping a garden journal.
The photos in this were realistic and encouraging. I live in the SE region on a hardiness map which has as being one of the longest growing seasons. Yay me! These parts were well explained. She guides you through every month with what to do and how.
Things I loved:
• Kitchen cupboard organics for insect and fungal control
• The ten uses of soap for a garden
• How to save seeds
• Homemade compost
The last part has a resource and service guide that was very, very helpful. And a metric conversion table for people like me who can never figure it out on my own.
I highly recommend this colorfully thorough, easy to follow gardening book. It’s great for anyone interested in learning gardening.
Thanks to Timber Press via Netgalley for this ARC. I’ve voluntarily given my review.

Loved it!

I’ve been scouring the shelves looking for a beginner’s book on veggie gardening that would be one-stop shop for what I need to get started. I’ve read some great books yet this one has risen to the top (and that ‘unseeded’ a top book that was stellar as well). This book has its own take, of course, and the blend of friendly prose and (not off-putting) technical approach to gardening was the perfect mix. The author offered all the hints and tips from organic gardening (which I was particularly keen on) to container, to planning to harvesting. This book had it all and was fun to read to boot. I will be looking for this book in print as I will be re-reading it often. If you read only one veggie gardening book this year, I highly recommend it be this one!

*I happily reviewed this book
**Thank you to NetGalley

This book came to me at the perfect time!! After reading this book I am ready to get out and start planting! The author gives great advice for all the different zones in America. So you know exactly when to plant and when you can expect to harvest your veggies! I can’t wait to get out there and start.

A blessing for home gardening aficionados everywhere! The Beginner’s Guide to Growing Great Vegetables is chock full of vegetable planting tips and advice just in time for planting season in the South. This will be reference book you will return to time and again to increase your harvest yields.

The Beginner’s Guide to Growing Great Vegetables is a new tutorial gardening guide by Lorene Edwards Forkner. Released 16th March 2021 by Workman Publishing on their Timber Press imprint, it's 224 pages and is available in paperback and ebook formats.

This is a comprehensive and well written guide full of easy to understand advice for getting started and succeeding with vegetable gardening. It's slanted toward readers in North America and USDA regional maps and zones are those used in the USA. The first section is a good intro to the concepts and first steps to get started (and succeed) with a garden. The author does a good job explaining the basics and the first chapters are full of clear tables and illustrations as well as a short glossary of terms. The author gives a good overview over soil, water, siting, light conditions, local climate zones, garden planning, and more.

The following chapters are set up chronologically with garden tasks for each month Jan-Dec. There is also an abbreviated herbal listing of edibles from A - Z including all the usual garden favorites as well as some surprises. Each of the listings includes the name (common names only), culture info, planting info for each of the regions, growing and harvesting info, and some varieties to try out.

The appendices include resources and suppliers links, some often overlooked vegetables to seek out and try, an abbreviated bibliography, metric conversion chart, and a cross-referenced index.

The photography throughout the book is lush, clear, and abundant. It's very inspiring to see healthy vegetables and plants, well displayed and appealing.

Four stars. A good beginner's guide. I would recommend it for garden groups, library acquisition, or for the home gardener's library.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Such a great book for a beginning gardener like me! Took huge amounts of notes, my only complaint was that it was on my iPad and not in the margins of the actual book! Hugely helpful and inspires me to start planting now.

Good reference material.. Lovely illustrations that were inspiring to look at. I already ordered copies for my library and look forward to looking through the print copy.

Truly fantastic gardening guide for both new and experienced vegetable gardeners! I love the month-by-month guide as well as all of the wonderful tips and tricks. The visuals throughout are also so beautiful and captivating. I can't wait for this book to come out to put it on my shelf and be able to reference it year after year! Highly recommended.

This is the book you wish you’d read before you went to the trouble of buying a mountain of compost, too many tools, and planted your garden all wrong. This common sense, clearly written guide takes you through a year of planning, planting, and harvest with good humor and wise counsel, the kind of hard-won knowledge it takes many years to acquire. Handsomely illustrated throughout, it is also a delightful read, as the author’s voice is friendly, reassuring, and always encouraging. Her enthusiasm is infectious; the advice offered is easy to understand and jargon-free. The most timid novice as well as the seasoned grower of tomato plants will want to branch out after perusing this book. Beautifully written and conceived, this guide is one any gardener will appreciate, as it leads you confidently through a productive year in your garden, to reap and enjoy, and finally, to plan for the next growing season. Lorene Edwards Forkner has written a guide to growing great vegetables that deserves to become a standard. Highly recommended. I received a prepublication digital copy from NetGalley.

Picking up bits and pieces of gardening wisdom over the years from family and friends, along with simply learning by trial and error, I’m always up for honing my knowledge. However, the sheer volume of gardening manuals and how-tos out there make selecting the best books to meet my needs anything, but easy. The title and a swift perusal of the blurb had me instinctively reaching for this book and anticipating it would fill in some of my learning gaps or giving me new possibilities to consider without being too big a challenge or a budget issue.

The Beginner’s Guide was methodically put together. It truly assumes the reader is a novice at gardening. It doesn’t rush off into complicated gardening methods and assume the reader will figure a great deal out on their own, but it also doesn’t talk down to the reader, either. The book starts with helping the reader consider their living space to help determine what type of gardening they can consider and consider what results they reader wants, to determine planning their garden size and make up. Once plotting and planning the gardening space is underway, there were discussions about testing soil and depending on the results how to enrich the soil as needed. Following this was consideration for climate and weather patterns which came with helpful hacks to extend northern growing season or protect southern plantings from dry and heat.

Following the soil topic, there were considerations for water sources like having a rain barrel collector to help reduce the amount of metered water used and doing composting to rejuvenate the soil. Also, crop rotation and how certain plants are good neighbors to put into the soil what the other plant needs.

Next, there was the discussion about seeds. A chart about the expiration dates on types of seeds, how to read a seed packet, and what the growing season is on the various vegetables and herbs. There was also a handy discussion about ordering the plantings so that those who could go earlier would be producing right around the time the next group was just starting and leaving time for a second planting of some all occupying the same space. This was particularly helpful to me as I have limited garden plot spaces because of the tall trees around which limit the full sun spots.

The bulk of the book was a growing season calendar, starting with January including what action could be taken, what was needed to prep, and a break down by planting regions (it is specific to US gardening regions). Here in the monthly pages are discussions that correspond with what is being prepped or growing that month. Like, in March there is a discussion of climbing frames because it is a good month to start peas and beans that like to climb. There are discussions about home remedies as opposed to insecticides. In July, there is a discussion about what plants need special attention to keeping their roots cooled and how to help keep heat damage and pest damage to a minimum.

By the end, there is a wealth of knowledge about the traits of the vegetables and herbs themselves. Growing complimentary foods and seasonings and growing to fit needs so there is enough produced and not too much, or that the novice actually planted vegetables they will actually eat and like.

Incidentally, the book’s ideas and implementations are friendly on the wallet. It gives options for various plans and ideas and doesn’t expect the reader to sink a fortune into their new gardening venture. In fact, by the considering questions and options posed, the book can save money with the good advice that lead to a fairly good chance at success and satisfaction.

I know I will be referencing back to this book quite often as I attempt some of the ideas for extending my production seasons, rather than just growing summer vegetables and trying to work the soil by smarter planting and soil enrichment. I’m even convinced it will be okay to grow certain plants in flower beds in front and side of the house and not just the conventional garden plot. I never gave much thought to seed expiration and how to check for viability so I’ve been able to thin out about half the seeds I was keeping until they were gone.

The Beginner’s Guide to Growing Great Vegetables has left me jazzed about gardening and was a well-organized book with wonderful charts, photos, and graphics, good index, and of course that splendid month by month planning guide. I can definitely recommend it to those who are interested, but haven’t started yet and those who are, like me, perhaps long time gardeners though still classified as beginners.

An approachable guide to reassure nervous first-time vegetable growers, and a helpful reference for even experienced gardeners. Activities and advice are broken down by month, with information on different growing regions. You can design your garden, decide what to plant, tend it, and harvest your vegetables. There's a compendium at the back of A-Z all things you can grow, with details on when to plant and different varieties. A useful guide for home gardeners and library collections.

A very complete book about how to grown you own vegetables, tips and tricks, and a lot of great information. I need to get a physical copy of this one. I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review

Easy to read, informative book with great pictures, charts and graphics throughout.
Gave me wonderful tips and ways to improve my vegetable garden. Highly recommend this book.

Enjoyed this book for beginning gardening. Just the right amount of information without being overwhelming. The photographs and charts are invaluable and make this book a resource to go back to again and again.

What an amazing book on gardening!!! While the title and cover set up the expectations on what the book is going to offer, the book, those gorgeous pages are filled with loads of useful, beginner friendly and understandable information to those who want to raise their own vegetables. I especially loved the way the sections in this book are created so that no matter which month of the year we are in, we have our work cut out for us, to fill our hearts and gardens with a little more fresh, organic, seasonal produce. I absolutely loved all the images, photography with all the acronyms explained and techniques illustrated. Kudos to the team for bring forward this wonderful book for all the gardening enthusiasts.

This was a very informative book. I am a gardener trapped in a busy city, with a small plot of land in the Midwest, where it’s cold nine months of the year. This book breaks down what is beneficial to start indoors, and when, how to collect seeds for next year and how to make a compost pile to enrich your soil. It breaks down the different regions and what steps to take each month throughout the year. All in all, a good book that I already ordered for my library. I’m sure I will reference it often.

A well written and informative guide. I learned something new and it's highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Confession time, I have a brown thumb. I inherited it from my mother, who has a thumb of death when it comes to plants. I love nature, plants and the idea of growing my own food, but have always thought that I wouldn't be able to grow anything other than cacti. So when I saw this book's title I thought, "why not try it"?

All I can say is WOW. I've always respected farmers and gardeners, but I had NO IDEA that it took SO MUCH just to have healthy, fruitful plants! This book isn't trying to scare you with data and what has to happen, but because it is so matter of fact about all of the work that goes into it, it scared me!

It takes a LOT of work, prep, sweat and brain power to have a gorgeous, productive garden. It's daunting, but this book lays out an easy "what to do" each month list and then delves deeper into what you can expect for that month and how to do the things in the list, for each growing season in North America.

If you are interested in starting to garden or are wondering what you can do for your current one (and you live in North America), I HIGHLY recommend this book. While I am scared of the work it's going to take, I immediately ordered a copy for myself and will be asking the gardening customers in our store to take a look at it and let me know what they think. We have one regular customer who is a wizard when it comes to gardening and I have a close friend who is also a gardening wizard and I want to see what they think of it, as this book blew me away.

5, I am going to grow my own fruits and veggies yet, stars!

My thanks to NetGalley and Timber Press for an eARC copy of this book to read and review.

This was a highly informative book for a complete novice gardener! The book is broken up into a calendar that informs the gardener of what they should be doing at this point in the year and what can be planted or harvested. With an emphasis on organic garden maintenance this book is perfect for anyone looking to take a next step in their eco life journey. If you have an interest in gardening definitely check this book out!

This was a pretty decent resource, although I don't think it would be helpful for more seasoned gardeners. While I have attempted gardening in the past, I really am a beginner, and for the beginner, this really is a pretty good resource that gives you a broad overview of everything you would need to plan and start a garden, including extra resources depending on what you're interested in doing or what your needs are. I had never heard of lasagna gardening and I appreciated that even though the author is from the PNW, she included resources and things to consider if you were in other parts of the country. In the end, there is an extra section on specific (and the more common) edibles and things to consider for each of them. I only wish she had included ginger, although I know I could look that up on my own. Overall, I would say that after reading this book, I don't think my current circumstances are suited for gardening, partly because I really don't have time for it! But I do have some ideas of some things I might be able to do, even if it's just in pots. So I appreciated this book and ultimately, the author urges us to plan ahead and start small, even if it's just a pot garden with herbs and such.

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Doesn't this cover call to you? If you have Kindle Unlimited you can get this book as part of your subscription. You will be inspired by the gorgeous photography throughout the book. The Beginners' Guide to Growing Great Vegetables i is packed with easy-to-access information to help anyone become a gardener. It includes explanations of planting zones, microclimates, how to kill pests with beer, and a month-by-month guide to starting a garden. It also includes instructions and tips for planting raised beds as well as containers and discusses using edibles as ornamentals. Why not have some beautiful kale in your front yard? It's pretty and tasty!

The book is filled with wonderful graphics to show you everything from how to lay out a garden, to DIY soil testing, and how to build a hoop house. In the past, I have purchased gardening books that I have opened and thumbed through and put aside because I felt overwhelmed by the content. This book is different, it's very beginner-focused focusing on why you will want to do certain things and when you will want to do them in order to grow vegetables in your backyard, front yard, or even on a balcony.

5 Stars- Comprehensive guide with a monthly planner!

This book was received as an ARC from Timber Press in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and thoughts expressed in this review are completely my own.

I am learning how to grow my own garden and the specifics about choosing the right vegetables to plant in it and this book made it easy and answered a lot of my pressing gardening questions. I loved how this book was broken down and the photos and diagrams presented through each chapter. It's also nice to get some suggestive combinations not only to grow in your garden but, make healthy dishes that will guarantee to be fresh and delicious. No only will I consider this book for our library collection but, I will definitely invest in this book for my own personal collection and I can't wait to see the results for planting my garden.

We will consider adding this title to our Non-Fiction collection at our library. That is why we give this book 5 stars.

THE BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO GROWING GREAT VEGETABLES by Lorene Edwards Forkner is an extremely useful guide for beginning gardeners. The text begins with sections on Gardening in North America (with a map of climate zones and comments on microclimates); Gardening 101 which reviews the important components of sun, water and soil as well as gardening vocabulary; and Garden Planning (covering garden bed design, spacing, etc.). The text is then organized seasonally; I especially like that the various monthly chapters include a quick check list of what "to do this month," including planning, preparing and maintaining, and sowing and planting. New gardeners can also refer to a later section labeled "Edibles A to Z" which provides information on growing and harvesting and quick descriptions of varieties for over two dozen vegetables like eggplant, spinach and tomatoes. THE BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO GROWING GREAT VEGETABLES received a starred review from Library Journal. I would heartily recommend this text for anyone who would like to experiment with growing their own healthy vegetables or learning more about topics like composting or about growing herbs, flowers, or fruit trees, all of which are discussed and beautifully illustrated. Forkner's manual is a valuable resource to consult again and again.

As promised, this is a great beginning guide for beginners looking to start a garden of any size! It gives all the information you need to get started in the US no matter your region and gives a great list and growing conditions for starter crops.

The author is a recognized horticultural writer, editor, and blogger who offers good advice to new gardeners in a clear, easy-to-understand format. This book, however, is written with a temperate climate in mind. The author states that in October, the garden is put to bed. During that time the tropical/subtropical areas (almost half of the lower 48 United States), fall gardeners are ramping up their garden tasks with harvests from the August-September garden planting and starting their cool-weather gardens. This point-of-view diminishes other valuable insights to the year-round gardeners and makes the book reminiscent of a personal journal than an overall beginner’s guide.
This book offers month-by-month to-do lists for each month, making it a truly helpful beginner’s guide for temperate gardeners. The writer more specifically speaks to the Pacific Northwest U.S. gardeners, with seemingly, random, obligatory notes entered for the warmer temperate and subtropical gardeners. Overall, a very basic guide for a novice gardener.

Brilliant guide for the beginning gardener — everything you need to know, with colourful photos and an easy-to-read format.

This book is a fantastic resource for beginners, with easy to follow step by steps and beautiful pictures throughout. I thought it was informative and interesting and the cover is gorgeous! While this may not contain novel information for the seasoned gardener, I feel that it is great for the novice, just as the title indicates.

This was a super easy-to-read and informative book that all gardeners should have on their shelves. I love how this book broke gardening down into easy-to-understand topics and really sets out to teach you, as the reader, versus just providing information. The photos are beautiful and really add the perfect touch to this book.

I enjoy reading new books on gardening. This book taught me some new skills that I am implementing in my garden!

The Beginner's Guide to Growing Great Vegetables by Lorene Edwards Forkner is a very informative book that will help you growing your own vegetables in no time! The book is organized into three sections: Getting Started, Get Planting, and Edibles A-Z. In Getting Started, Forkner covers gardening zones and the basics of gardening. In Get Planting, she outlines everything you need to do by each month of the year by your growing zones. In Edibles A-Z, you get a lot of information on vegetables and herbs and the best way to plant and harvest them.

Forkner covers a lot in her book that will be very helpful to anyone who has trouble growing their own vegetables. No land? No problem! This book also covers growing from your balcony! A very easy to follow guide book with colorful pictures that is perfect for novice gardeners! Recommended for anyone who needs that visual and step and by step guide to growing plants.

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the ebook. I have been interested in growing my garden have never had much success. This was very informative!

If you enjoy growing your own food and knowing there are no toxins used because you control all stages, this book will help you. Become self-sufficient in providing your own food and help the community as well.