Langer grew up in the West Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago, where he attended Daniel Boone Elementary School. He attended Evanston Township High School from 1980-1984 and graduated from Vassar College in 1988. Returning to Chicago, he worked for a little over a decade as an editor, nonfiction author, playwright, theater director, and film producer. In 2000, he won a fellowship to Columbia University's National Arts Journalism Program and remained in New York as a senior editor of Book Magazine until it folded in 2003. He is now a full-time writer. He had a weekly column in The Book Standard.

He is married to Beate Sissenich, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Indiana University-Bloomington. Their first daughter, Nora Langer Sissenich, was born on June 9, 2005; a second daughter, Solveig Langer Sissenich, was born September 10, 2009.

Novels

• Crossing California (2004)
• The Washington Story (2005)
• Ellington Boulevard (2008)
• My Father's Bonus March (2009)
• The Thieves of Manhattan (2010)

As contributor

• The Best Women's Stage Monologues 2000 (2000)
• The Best Men's Stage Monologues 2000 (2000)
• The Encyclopedia of Exes (2005)
• Chicago Noir (2005)
• The Big Book of Pregnancy and Parenting (2006)

Plays

• What I Need Is A Good Bonk On The Head (1989)
• Backstage Pass (1990)
• In The Shadow of A Smile (1991)
• Under The Gods (1992)
• The Blank Page (1995)
• Dark Matter (1996)
• Crime in The City (1997)
• Rock ‘n’ Roll Women (1997)
• Film Flam (1997)
• Three Glasses of Sherry (1998)
• The Critics (1999)
• Coaster (2000)
• What Remains Forgotten (2001)
• 214 Minutes (2002)
• Suramo (2002)

Other

• The Madness of Art (1996)