His work includes ten novels, short fiction and screenplays, as well as three collections of essays devoted to his life in the outdoors.

[3] McGuane's papers, manuscripts, and correspondence are located in the Montana State University Archives and Special Collections and are available for research use.

[4] McGuane's early novels were noted for a comic appreciation for the irrational core of many human endeavors, multiple takes on the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s.

McGuane was born in Wyandotte, Michigan, the son of Irish Catholic parents who moved to the Midwest from Massachusetts.

[5] Upon completing his Stegner Fellowship, McGuane and his first wife, Rebecca Portia Crockett, began to divide their time between Livingston, Montana, and Key West, Florida.

When the screen rights to The Sporting Club were purchased, he bought ranch property in Montana's Paradise Valley.

He entered a period where he became known as "Captain Berserko" and wrote screenplays for Rancho Deluxe (1975),[8] shot in Livingston; The Missouri Breaks (1976), directed by Arthur Penn and starring Jack Nicholson and Marlon Brando; and self-directing a film adaptation of 92 in the Shade (1975), starring Peter Fonda, Warren Oates, Margot Kidder and Harry Dean Stanton.

[11] In 2024 he appeared in a film about his time spent fishing and writing in the Florida Keys with other notable writers such as Jim Harrison, Richard Brautigan, Russell Chatham, and Jimmy Buffett.

Larry McMurtry observed that McGuane's nonfiction writing displays a markedly contrasting inner peace and natural spirituality.