When Dimple Met Rishi | Sandhya Menon | Review
The arranged marriage YA romcom you didn't know you wanted or needed...
Dimple's main aim in life is to escape her traditional parents, get to university, and begin her plan for tech world domination. Rishi's rich, good-looking, and a hopeless romantic. His parents think Dimple is the perfect match for him, but she's got other plans...
Dimple can't believe her luck when her parents agree to let her attend a summer program for young coders. She isn't just excited for the six weeks she'll spend creating a new app at Insomnia Con but also because her parents finally seem to be accepting her passion for all things tech. She's much less excited when she meets Rishi and discovers that her parents really agreed to let her attend Insomnia Con because they knew that he would be there too.
Dimple and Rishi's parents have decided that their children would be an ideal marriage match, something Rishi is fully on board with. Dimple, however, is most definitely not. Dimple is at Insomnia Con to win with her app idea and meet her idol. Rishi... well Rishi's mostly there at his parents wishes and Dimple is unimpressed to discover that he doesn't know the first thing about coding.
When Dimple Met Rishi is definitely a unique YA read. It's the first one I've come across where arranged marriage plays such an big part in the plot but that's not the only reason that this novel stands out. Dimple and Rishi are both appealing and dynamic characters, and you just can't help but root for them both from the very beginning. Dimple loves her family but with her passion for coding and her desire to go against so many of her parents' traditions, she feels like she is a disappointment to them, and they just don't seem to understand her. Rishi on the other hand is every part the dutiful son, living up to his family's expectations to the point where he is about to give up his passion of drawing comics for the sensible career that his parents want him to have.
The novel follows both Rishi and Dimple during their six weeks at Insomnia Con as they overcome their awkward first meeting and begin to find some common ground and help each other in ways they didn't realise they needed. It's a sweet love story, full of the intensity of first love, but it's about Dimple and Rishi's relationships to their families and themselves as much as their relationships to each other. With such an abundance of absent parents in YA novels, this is one of those refreshing few where family aren't just important to the main characters, but central to their stories.
If I have one small complaint it's only that for a novel set at a coding camp, there isn't a whole lot of coding. With so much talk of Dimple's passion for it, it's a shame that we don't ever really see her doing it, the way that we see Rishi drawing. There is however a talent competition that makes for excellent reading and really, what a small complaint for such a great novel.
When Dimple Met Rishi is warm, funny, and a perfect read for summer.
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