Stenger received his B.A. in history from Stanford University in 1959, followed by a Ph.D in American literature in 1964. He served as a Professor of American Literature and Director of the creative writing program at the University of California, Santa Cruz from 1965 to 1995, at which time he focused his efforts on writing. He has received a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship (1980), a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship (1981) and a Guggenheim Fellowship (1982). He is married to novelist Lynn Stegner. They live in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Non-fiction

• Escape Into Aesthetics, The Dial Press, c1966, Library of Congress Number 68-22588
• Nabokov's Congeries, The Viking Press, c1968, Library of Congross Catalogue Number 68-22868
• American Places, (with Wallace Stegner and Eliot Porter), E.P.Dutton, c1981, ISBN 0-525-05390-5
• Islands of the West, Sierra Club Books, c1985, ISBN 0-87156-844-6
• Outposts of Eden : a Curmudgeon at Large in the American West, Sierra Club Books, c1989, ISBN 0-87156-672-9
• Grand Canyon: The Great Abyss, Tehabi Books, c1995, ISBN 0-06-258573-8
• Winning the Wild West : the Epic Saga of the American Frontier, 1800-1899, foreword by Larry McMurtry, Tehabi Books, c2002 ISBN 0-7432-3291-7
• Adios, Amigos : Tales of Sustenance and Purification in the American West, Counterpoint, c2008, ISBN 1-59376-169-4

Fiction

• The Edge, The Dial Press, c1968, Library of Congress Catalog Number 67-25307
• Hawks and Harriers, The Dial Press, c1972, Library of Congress Catalog Number 75-163588
• Sportscar Menopause, Atlantic Little-Brown, c1977, ISBN 0-316-81224-2