Jim Bennett was born in Daniel's Harbour, Newfoundland. Upon graduating from Memorial University, he joined the financial planning industry. After an award-winning, fifteen-year career in Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and Alberta, he entered law school, graduating with an LLB from Windsor and a JD from Detroit. He practiced law, mostly contested matters, in Ontario until 2002, when he returned home to Daniel's Harbour and opened a law practice. In 2011 he was elected to the Newfoundland and Labrador House of Assembly where he served for four years. He did not run for re-election in 2015. Today he writes and practices law. Jim is married to Ontario resident and former Cabinet Minister Sandra Pupatello and divides his time between both provinces.

Degrees of Guilt is the first of what he hopes to be a series of novels that allow readers to explore human motivation through the world of fiction, often set in Newfoundland.