Review for When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon!
Quick View Review:
Overall Rating: **** (4/5)
One Sentence Review: An incredibly cute contemporary that will have you laughing out loud CONSTANTLY, the characters in this book felt like real people, and the story was predictable in the absolute best way possible.
Full Review:
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. (Summary from Amazon)
*I was provided an ARC by the publisher, but this DOES NOT affect my opinion of the book*
This book was so insanely cute. SO. CUTE. It was cheesy but in the absolute best way possible: yes, we all knew how this story was going to end, but that didn’t mean that I didn’t enjoy every single second of reading this novel, which taught me so much and always put me in the best of moods.
This novel is also one of the funniest I’ve ever read. I hardly ever actually laugh out loud while reading, but that definitely happened at multiple instances throughout this story.
So now for the characters. Dimple is my IDOL: I absolutely loved her passion, her determination, her confidence, her attitude, EVERYTHING. She was so realistic, meaning she was flawed, yes, but her flaws only, in my opinion, added to how much I looked up to her all throughout the book. And then there’s Rishi. So adorable and dorky and lovable and if there’s someone out there who doesn’t fall in love with him then they’re definitely heartless. He was always full of hope and so, so selfless; when he finally got something that he wanted for himself it made me happy beyond words. I wanted to reach through the pages and give him a big hug, because he deserved the world. I know I’m talking about these characters as if they’re real people, but in my mind they basically are: they were so well-written and the story was ordinary in that it could actually be happening right now, but extraordinary in that it really isn’t a story told enough.
Where this book was only slightly lacking was in plot. Until the very end, there wasn’t a whole lot of conflict present, and I was really missing the true coding and web development parts I was looking forward to: being a semi-coder myself, this was a unique aspect of the book I was super excited about, and was slightly disappointed to not see as much of Dimple’s project development as I did Dimple and Rishi’s nights out.
Another thing I loved about this book was how much it taught me about Indian culture. I obviously can’t speak for the accuracy or quality of the representation present myself, but I certainly enjoyed getting to witness a culture I’m not exposed to every day.
Overall, though, I really did adore this book, and if you’re looking for a summer contemporary to pick up, then this is for sure the book for you!
Make sure to come back next Wednesday for a new review!
Xoxo,
Jordan
