When Dimple Met Rishi

When Dimple met Rishi is Sandhya Menon debut novel. This teen read will take you into the Indian families of Dimple Shah and Rishi Patel. Dimple is a modern American girl that wants to break free of the family tradition of finding the Ideal Indian Husband (I.I.H.). She is more focused on her schooling and moving on her own than her family. Rishi embraces his Indian heritage and is traditional with his parents. His little brother, Ashish, brother bracing his more American culture.

The writing style of the story is enjoyable. It jumps back and forth between Dimple and Rishi’s points of view in the third person. The limited omniscient view of each character gives their feelings about each situation. It was smoothly done and not choppy, which can happen with this type of writing. With multiple dynamic characters, it keeps the section focused on them without throwing out the other main character’s feelings.

[Dimple]“I was so afraid of going down the same path as my parents, of ending up in the same domestic life, that I forgot to consider one thing: this is our life. We get to decide the rules. We get to say what goes and what stays, what matters and what doesn’t.” (When Dimple met Rishi, 378)

Kismet, is fate in Hindi. There are few Hindi phrases and words throughout the book. It does not translate a few of them, yet you can use context clues. Kismet becomes the driving theme in the story. Rishi believes in Kismet strongly, whereas Dimple is more turned off by the idea because of her character’s disinterest in tradition.

The story of the two young teens starts with participating in a program at the San Francisco University campus for an App designing competition. Rishi only going because their parents arranged for them to possibly get married; Dimple’s parents did not tell her because of her dismissal of the whole domestic life.

The two work together throughout the summer with the awkward beginning with Dimple discovering her parents’ deceit from Rishi. In the end, they discover that there is more than one road to getting what you want, and sometimes it is not what you expect.

Dimple laughed, shaking her head. “I know. Crazy.” Shrugging, she added, “I mean, not crazy crazy. We do both live pretty close to each other, and our parents are part of the Indian community in NorCal, which isn’t that huge….”

“No.” Rishi rubbed the back of his neck. “Still crazy.” Softly, he said, “Kismet.” (When Dimple met Rishi, 180.)

The title was clever since the story is about how the two met. Rishi’s parents met similarly. He described his mother as a free spirit and he saw that in Dimple when he saw her picture for the first time.

The famous story of his parents’ meeting is his mother beating his father with an umbrella because she did not know who he was when he was sent to court her. With Dimple and Rishi, she threw a cup of ice coffee at him because of the same reason. This is interesting because Rishi’s mother is happily married to her father. We can conceive it as a foreshowing of the relationship that Dimple and Rishi will have. Unsure, but in the end, it will be fine.

The story is an overall great read. Easy and not overly complicated and gives a light insight into Indian family life and traditions. The feel-good story about the importance of family and also doing your own thing.