Laurence van Cott Niven was born on April 30, 1938 in Los Angeles, California, and grew up primarily in Beverly Hills. Niven studied briefly at the California Institute of Technology before eventually graduating with a bachelor's in mathematics and minor in psychology from Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas in 1962. He completed one year of a graduate program at the University of California-Los Angeles in mathematics but dropped out to write science fiction.

Niven sold his first story, "The Coldest Place," in 1964. Niven's interests in scientific discovery have led him to write stories grounded in recent and cutting-edge theories on astronomy and physics. Niven is perhaps best known for Ringworld, published in 1970 and receiving the 1970 Nebula Award for Best Novel and 1971 Hugo Award for Best Novel.

Niven has received several other Hugo Awards for Best Short Story and several Locus Awards for novels, short stories, and a single author collection.

Niven's novel Destiny's Road was published in 1997 by Easton Press as part of their "Signed First Editions of Science Fiction" series. The novel was later published in wider release that same year by Tor, with a British edition made available through Orbit.