A review by megsbookishtwins
When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon

5.0

I received this free from the publishers via Netgalley

Dimple is passionate about coding and has been dreaming of going to Insomnia Con, a summer program for aspiring web developers where the winner gets to meet Jenny Lindt - a successful woman in the technology buisness – an idol of Dimple. So when her parents agree to pay for this program, she finally starts to believe that her parents have finally come around to the idea that she isn’t ready for a husband yet. But then Rishi comes along. He is romantic, traditional, and artistic, but when he introduced himself jokily as her future husband, she throws her drink in his face. Turns out, her and Rishi’s parents arranged their meeting believing them to be a match…

When Dimple Met Rishi was, simply put, a lovely read. When Dimple Met Rishi was a fantastically written and fun arranged marriage YA romantic comedy. I think I’ll forever be recommending this book to anyone who is looking for a good romantic comedy. But not just that, I feel like it is also an incredibly important book. When Dimple Met Rishi features two Indian American protagonists falling in love. Something which is important so that young Indian girls and boys who can finally see themselves represented in a mainstream YA book. But that isn’t the only reason it’s a great book. For starters, the characters are great and I loved BOTH Dimple and Rishi.

Dimple was my favourite as she was spirited, carefree, and very ambitious. She was fighting against her parents and their traditions. She thought they only cared who she married and how she looked not who she was or what her dreams and ambitions were. I liked how she figured out that all they really wanted was her to be happy, and that they were proud of her and her accomplishments, and always have been. I also loved that Dimple was so passionate about technology, coding, and web development, I think that sends some really great messages to young people, as we need more women in technology, especially marginalised. I also really adored Rishi as he was traditional, artistic, and kind and out of the two, he was the hopeless romantic which is always nice to see. I also liked that Rishi was very traditional and that he wanted to keep up his family’s tradition and heritage, but I also liked how he developed throughout the book to decide what he wanted to do and follow his art rather than do what his parents wanted.

The romance played a central role in the book, which I’m not usually a big fan of but I enjoyed Dimple and Rishi so much individually it was hard not to love them together. I love how their personalities contrasted so well with each other, but they still got along so well. It was a lovely romance full of mutual support, encouragement and admiration.

Overall, definitely a book I’d recommend to any romance and contemporary lovers. This is a book not to miss.