Review: When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon

When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Publication Date: May 30th, 2017

Rating: 4 Stars

Source: Purchase

Format: Hardcover

Pages: 380

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Summary (from Goodreads):

Dimple Shah has it all figured out. With graduation behind her, she’s more than ready for a break from her family, from Mamma’s inexplicable obsession with her finding the “Ideal Indian Husband.” Ugh. Dimple knows they must respect her principles on some level, though. If they truly believed she needed a husband right now, they wouldn’t have paid for her to attend a summer program for aspiring web developers…right?

Rishi Patel is a hopeless romantic. So when his parents tell him that his future wife will be attending the same summer program as him—wherein he’ll have to woo her—he’s totally on board. Because as silly as it sounds to most people in his life, Rishi wants to be arranged, believes in the power of tradition, stability, and being a part of something much bigger than himself.

The Shahs and Patels didn’t mean to start turning the wheels on this “suggested arrangement” so early in their children’s lives, but when they noticed them both gravitate toward the same summer program, they figured, Why not?

Dimple and Rishi may think they have each other figured out. But when opposites clash, love works hard to prove itself in the most unexpected ways.

I have seen a lot of recent discussion on Twitter surrounding this book. These discussions gave me certain expectations about what I was going to be getting in this book and I have to say, those discussions don't really do this book justice at all.

I absolutely adored When Dimple Met Rishi. It was adorable. It was fun. I am always super nervous going into a fluffier sounding contemporary novel because, as I always seem to mention in these reviews, they are not generally my favorite. Maybe my reading tastes are changing??

So, this book is about Dimple Shah and Rishi Patel. Their parents have arranged for them to meet as a possible marriage match. Rishi, who is super traditional, is excited at the possibility of meeting the woman his parents picked out to be his possible future wife.

Dimple, on the other hand, doesn't actually know about this match. She wants to focus more on her career and becoming a web developer. She doesn't want to have to worry about getting married and having children yet. So, she is super excited when her parents let her attend a summer program for aspiring coders. She doesn't know that she is going to be meeting Rishi.

One of the expectations that I had about this book was that the romance wasn't going to be super smooth. Rishi wants to be arranged, Dimple absolutely does not. I didn't think that they were actually going to end up becoming such fast friends and start falling for each other so easily. Or rather, I didn't expect it from Dimple.

That was definitely not a bad thing though. I absolutely loved watching their relationship unfold. I did expect a bit more pushback from Dimple just because she was so vehemently against this, but she blames her parents for this whole fiasco, not Rishi.

The other major expectation that I had going in was that I was absolutely not going to like Dimple, at least not right away. The internet made her out to be so awful, saying she's unlikable and abusive. I was not expecting to love her from the get go. But I did. She's really focused on her dream of becoming a web developer and changing lives with her app idea for Insomnia Con. She knows what she wants out of life and she doesn't believe that she can have it if she falls for Rishi.

I was under the impression that she was going to be mean to Rishi, but I don't really find that to be the case at all. I felt like she understood that the situation that they found themselves in was not his doing and that she made every effort to be his friend and be nice to him.

I always knew that I was going to love Rishi. He's SO sweet and thoughtful and caring... Basically he is just every good and pure thing in this world. He really wants this thing with Dimple to work out and he makes every possible effort. I loved it.

And to address the rumor that Dimple is abusive. I think that's crap. She punches Rishi in the ribs on a few occasions. But it's not like she's beating him. She does it once every now and then. I don't remember exactly what any of the situations were where she did it, but still. The first time she does it, he said it hurt, but I felt like she clearly made an effort to not do it so hard in the future.

If she were repeatedly hitting him over and over and doing it hard with the intention to hurt him, yes, Dimple would be abusive. But she's not doing it that way.

And if that makes her abusive then I think that a lot of teenage girls in this world are "abusive". Pretty sure that if punching someone in the arm like Dimple does in this book makes a person abusive, then I am abusive because I give my BF a good punch in the shoulder every now and then. But he deserves it when he tells me things like "Thanks, I like your mustache" after I tell him I like his haircut.

And people rating this book low because of Dimple dumping her iced coffee on Rishi is ridiculous. Because that was absolutely a decent reaction to the situation that Dimple found herself in. Rishi doesn't necessarily deserve that, but he expected her to know about him and she didn't. I, too, would dump my coffee on a stranger that came up to me talking about how I was his future wife.

The only thing that Dimple did in this book that I personally found to be cringe-worthy was going through Rishi's sketchbook without his consent. That's probably the only discussion that I have seen on Twitter that I agree with. That was a bad move on her part, but it does get dealt with in the book.

Overall, I LOVED this book. I wish there would have been a glossary/pronunciation key in the back for some things, but other than that, I can't complain. I will be (not so) patiently waiting for the companion, When Ashish Met Sweetie, to come out.

Have you read When Dimple Met Rishi? Have you read any of the discussions surrounding this book? What are your thoughts?