[citation needed] She grew up in Chandigarh, where her father was the head of Punjab Police, and graduated from Lady Shri Ram College in 1977, in Economics (Hons).

[citation needed] Her award-winning novel Witness the Night, was the first in the series featuring the feisty Indian middle-aged social worker-cum-crime investigator, Simran Singh.

In a small town in the heart of India, a young girl, barely alive, is found in a sprawling house where thirteen people lie dead.

The judges of the Costa Award (Anita Rani, Anneka Rice and Mark Thornton)[8] said "Kishwar Desai pulls off a remarkable trick, transplanting a country-house murder to modern-day India in a book that's not afraid to tackle serious themes".

Simran Singh is asked to examine the case of an abandoned baby at an IVF clinic and what follows is a maze of new age fertility rites, and surrogacy.

[citation needed] In her latest novel, The Sea of Innocence, Simran Singh is trying to find a British girl Liza Kay who has gone missing from the beaches of Goa.

The book based on interviews with the Dutt family and friends, explored their lives in detail and tells the larger story of the evolution of Hindi cinema, and of a society and a nation in the throes of change.

Desai also released a book in 2020, called The Longest Kiss which is the story of Bombay Talkies founder and actress Devika Rani.