Deaver was born in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. Many of his books tend to promote lateral thinking, particularly his short story collection Twisted. One of his books, The Blue Nowhere, features criminal hackers (one using social engineering to commit murder), as well as a law enforcement computer crime unit. His most popular series features his regular character Lincoln Rhyme, a quadriplegic detective, and Amelia Sachs. According to a 2006 interview on The Early Show, Deaver stated that he would rotate between his new series and Lincoln Rhyme each year. Virtually all of his works feature a trick ending, or sometimes multiple trick endings.

Deaver edited The Best American Mystery Stories 2009.

Two of Deaver's novels have been produced into films: The Bone Collector (1999), and A Maiden's Grave as the TV film Dead Silence (1997).

Deaver also created the characters and - in a collaboration with 14 other noted writers - wrote the 17-part serial thriller The Chopin Manuscript narrated by Alfred Molina that was broadcast on Audible.com from September 25th to November 13, 2007.

Deaver will write the next James Bond novel. The novel, known as Project X until the title is announced, is set in the present era and will be published on 28 May 2011. He will be the second American author to write Bond novels, after Raymond Benson.

Standalone works

• Always a Thief as Jeffery Wilds Deaver (out of print)
• Voodoo as Jeffery Wilds Deaver (out of print)
• Mistress of Justice (1992)
• The Lesson of Her Death (1993)
• Praying For Sleep (1994)
• A Maiden's Grave (1995)
• The Devil's Teardrop (1999)
• Speaking In Tongues (2000)
• The Blue Nowhere (2001)
• Garden of Beasts (2004)
• Edge (2010)

Rune Trilogy

• Manhattan Is My Beat (1988)
• Death of a Blue Movie Star (1990)
• Hard News (1991)

John Pellam

• Shallow Graves (1992)
• Bloody River Blues (1993)
• Hell's Kitchen (2001)

Lincoln Rhyme

• The Bone Collector (1997)
• The Coffin Dancer (1998)
• The Empty Chair (2000)
• The Stone Monkey (2002)
• The Vanished Man (2003)
• The Twelfth Card (2005)
• The Cold Moon (2006)
• The Broken Window (2008)
• The Burning Wire (2010)

Kathryn Dance

• The Cold Moon (2006)
• The Sleeping Doll (2007)
• Roadside Crosses (2009)
• Interrogation (2013)

Brynn McKenzie

• The Bodies Left Behind (2008)

James Bond

• Project X (2011)

Collections

• A Confederacy of Crime (2001)
• Twisted (2003)
• More Twisted (2006)