Amanda Jaffe series by Phillip Margolin

The Author

Phillip Margolin (born 1944) is an American writer of legal thrillers.

Margolin was born in New York City in 1944. After receiving a B.A. in Government in 1965, from American University in Washington, D.C., he worked as a Peace Corps volunteer in Liberia until 1967. He graduated from the New York University School of Law in 1970, and has worked for 25 years as a criminal defense attorney, an occupation of choice inspired by the Perry Mason books. He started to work in 1970 at the Oregon Court of Appeals.

He published his first story, a short story titled "The Girl in the Yellow Bikini", in 1974, and became a full-time writer in 1996. He has written 12 books as of January 2007. He lists as his favourite writer Joseph Conrad, and among his favourite books War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy and Stone City by Mitchell Smith.

Philip Margolin was married to Doreen Stamm in 1968. They had two children, Ami and Daniel. Doreen, also a defense attorney, died from cancer in January 2007.

Phillip Margolin is also the president of Chess for Success, a non-profit organisation "dedicated to helping children develop skills necessary for success in school and life by learning chess".

The Books

Mystery, Thriller, Suspense

Thursday: Subject is still combative after four days of applied pain, sleep deprivation and minimal food.

Vice squad detective Bobby Vasquez, for months on the trail of a slippery underworld figure, receives an anonymous tip that directs him to a mountain cabin. He races through the idyllic Oregon woods, expecting to close the book on a long-standing vendetta. What he finds instead opens a Pandora's box of horror that will haunt him to his dying day.

8:10: Subject bound and gaffed and placed...

The books in suggested reading order
Wild Justice
Ties That Bind
Proof Positive
The Fugitive
Violent Crimes