Griffin Garnett, JD ’39, is a 92 year-old World War II Veteran with a flair for writing adventures.

Garnett’s latest book, Marcus, hit the shelves in May. The novel is the third and final installment of Garnett’s award-winning The Arlington Trilogy, which he started writing in the early 1990s. At the 2006 Do It Yourself Book Festival, in which thousands of independent writers and publishers compete, Garnett won runner-up in the fiction category for Marcus. The trilogy grew out of Garnett’s experiences during WWII.

In 1943, he enlisted in the Navy and eventually became the executive officer of a ship, the L.S.M. 130. He and his crew were subsequently deployed to Panama, New Guinea, and finally the Philippines, where they fought in the Invasion of Balikpapan. In 1945, Garnett was sent home. In 1948, he passed the Virginia Bar and began his legal career.

Garnett’s first passion was law. After graduating from National University Law School, which is now part of GW’s Law School, he practiced trial law in Northern Virginia for more than 55 years and dabbled in creative writing in his spare time.

After working in law for more than half a century, Garnett decided to pursue writing, which was his second passion. Inspired by his time in the Navy during and after WWII, he incorporated those experiences into his writing. His first work, Tales From Orchard Point, was published by a regional magazine, followed by three published novels: The Sandscrapers, a nominee for the Third Annual Library of Virginia Fiction Award; Taboo Avenged; and finally, Marcus; the final book of his trilogy.

Garnett’s characters are officers of the Navy involved in complex adventures. As one reviewer stated, Marcus is “a story that’s satisfying—the reader is taken high and low—and after breathlessness—is left satisfied.”