For the novel Tomb of Sand, written in Hindi, Geetanjali Shree became the first Indian author to win the International Booker Prize in 2022. The book is about an eighty-year-old woman who falls into a deep depression after the death of her husband, then resurfaces to gain a new lease on life. Her determination to fly in the face of convention – including striking up a friendship with a hijra (trans) woman – confuses her bohemian daughter, who is used to thinking of herself as the more 'modern' of the two. At the older woman's insistence they travel back to Pakistan, simultaneously confronting the unresolved trauma of her teenage experiences of Partition, and re-evaluating what it means to be a mother, a daughter, a woman, a feminist.
Rather than respond to tragedy with seriousness, Geetanjali Shree's playful tone and exuberant wordplay results in a book that is engaging, funny, and utterly original, at the same time as being an urgent and timely protest against the destructive impact of borders and boundaries, whether between religions, countries, or genders.

The Booker Prize jury praised the book as a luminous novel of India and partition, but one whose spellbinding brio and fierce compassion weaves youth and age, male and female, family and nation into a kaleidoscopic whole.

Her versatility and literary expressiveness have made Geetanjali Shree (born 1957 in Mainpuri), one of India's most important feminist voices and writers. The central theme of her works is the exploration of female identity and the challenges women face in a patriarchal society. The BBC ranks her among the 100 most influential and inspiring women in the world ("100 Women").