Bloomability is a children's book by Sharon Creech, first published in 1998. It follows the story of Domenica "Dinnie" Doone, a young girl who goes from living with her semi-nomadic family in the United States to attending a boarding school in Lugano, Switzerland, and begins to redefine her life as a result.
This series provides examples of:
- Aerith and Bob: The family consists of Dinnie (whose full first name is Domenica), her sister Stella and her brother...Crick. Dinnie explains in the exposition that, as per an agreement between her parents, her brother was named by her father, while the girls were named by their mother; her mother, being the child of Italian immigrants, gave the girls traditional Italian names, while her father, who came from rural Kentucky, gave his son a name more befitting his "country boy" background.
- Ambiguous Ending: At the end of the story, before Dinnie flies home to stay with her parents for summer break, her aunt and uncle tell her that they and her parents have agreed to give her a choice for the upcoming school year: return to Switzerland and continue attending the boarding school, or stay with her parents in America and start high school there. The book ends before she makes her decision, or even has any real inkling of what that decision is likely to be.
- Artistic License – Law: In the first chapter, Dinnie's sister Stella gets married behind her parents' back at the age of 16. No state in the US allows a 16-year-old to marry without the consent of at least one parent, so unless she falsified either her age or her parents' consent (either of which would almost certainly make the marriage invalid anyway), she shouldn't have been able to get a marriage license.
- The fact that Stella's husband is a Marine, and therefore presumably 18 or older, also raises some age-of-consent questions, given that the Doones were living in California at the time of the marriage and California's age of consent is 18 with no "Romeo and Juliet" exception — and if they went to a different state to marry, even if it wasn't a deliberate act to avoid age of consent laws, that could be a criminal violation unto itself. This one is somewhat more justified, however, given that someone would have to report a crime in order for anything to be investigated, so it would probably fly under the radar until Stella has the baby, at which point they're living in New Mexico, a state that does have the close-in-age exception. note
- Dating What Daddy Hates: At one point, Mari and Belen admit that their families would be aghast at them even thinking about boys from other cultures and countries, especially boys who aren't white, in a romantic way. Since they're only in middle school, these aren't exactly serious relationships so much as basically mutual crushes, but they still have to be careful how they talk about the boys in question when they're at home lest their parents freak out.
- Dinnie's maternal grandparents never liked Dinnie's father; Dinnie doesn't get a lot of information on the details, but from what little she can glean, they seemingly looked down on him because he was working-class and not college educated.
- I Will Find You: At the end of the book, Guthrie tells Dinnie that even if she chooses not to return to the school, he'll find her in America so they can stay in contact. Whether this is as friends or potentially something more is open to interpretation.
- Jerkass Has a Point: Dinnie's maternal grandmother is pretty rude about Dinnie's father, and it's clear that a lot of her disdain is based on class and education snobbery, but she's not altogether wrong to raise concerns about the family's transient lifestyle, particularly when it comes to how they're raising the kids, as Dinnie's own recollections hint at the idea that she and her siblings endured a lot of hardship due to being dragged along with their father's nomadic ways.
- Last-Name Basis: Peter Guthrie, one of Dinnie's classmates at the school. Only his father and the headmistress ever call him Peter; to everyone else, he's Guthrie.
- Left Hanging: What is the deal with Lila? Near the end of the story, Dinnie realizes she forgot to ask her aunt and uncle for the promised explanation, and then decides not to pursue it as it's not relevant anymore since Lila's no longer at the school, so the reader never learns the backstory that was hinted at.
- Malaproper: Keisuke, who is Japanese and is still figuring out English, is prone to these. Dinnie starts to adopt a few of them in the narration; for instance, after Keisuke uses the term "downfelling" instead of "falling down" to refer to Dinnie's difficulties in learning to ski, Dinnie makes several references to "downfelling" in later skiing scenes."We managed to ski over to the hut without downfelling and were quite proud of ourselves."
- My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels: Dinnie has to learn Italian in order to get around in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland she lives in. She eventually gets the hang of it, but runs into this trope a few times along the way."According to my teacher, I had told her I went to bed at seven hundred o’clock, and that I was three hundred and thirty years old. She said I’d just asked my classmate 'How much does the time cost?' and 'I want six hundred potatoes, no thank you'."
- Off to Boarding School: Of a sort; at the beginning of Chapter 2, Dinnie is sent to attend a boarding school in Switzerland run by her aunt and uncle, although she gets an exception to live with said aunt and uncle instead of in the student housing. The reasons aren't explicitly stated, but given the hardships her family was constantly facing and the impact it had already had on Dinnie's older siblings (her brother was in trouble with the law and her sister had a baby at 16), it was likely a genuine attempt to give her a shot at a better life. She initially resents it, thinking her parents are just trying to get rid of her, but eventually starts to understand and appreciate the opportunity that she was presented with (the fact that she finds she really likes the school helps a lot), and at the end of the book she's genuinely torn about whether she wants to stay with her parents or go back to the boarding school for the following year.
- Oh, Crap!: After Lila and Guthrie are caught in an avalanche, the teacher finds that someone had forgotten to put on the special transponder they're supposed to wear so they can be found in that exact situation, and as the other kids all have theirs, it becomes clear, much to everyone's horror, that the person who forgot theirs is one of the missing pair. Fortunately, both Lila and Guthrie are ultimately rescued alive despite this.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Dinnie's full first name, Domenica, is only mentioned once, by Dinnie herself in the introductory part of her narration, and is never actually spoken by any character over the course of the book.
- Parents as People: Dinnie's parents clearly love their children and want the best for them, but Dinnie's father drags them all along to live his preferred nomadic lifestyle without really giving any consideration to the impact that the lack of stability might have on his kids, and her mother accepts this without question. It's handled fairly realistically: Dinnie herself narrates this element of her life as a neutral thing, as she has no real points of comparison, but to a reader coming from an objective perspective, the selfishness of her father and the all-around troubling aspects of her stories come through pretty clearly.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The energetic and impulsive Guthrie (red) and the quiet and serious Keisuke (blue) are best friends within a few weeks of meeting. Dinnie notes that they balance each other out in a way that makes their friendship work.
- Spoiled Brat: Lila, one of Dinnie's classmates at the boarding school, constantly complains about everything and everyone — sometimes crossing into outright bigotry, such as complaining about how many non-Americans are at the school — to the point where she quickly alienates just about everyone other than Dinnie herself (who insists on sticking by Lila despite Lila's questionable treatment of her) and Guthrie. It's hinted that she may have some Hidden Depths that explain why she is the way she is, but it's never revealed exactly what those are.
- Teen Pregnancy: Dinnie's sister Stella, aged 16 at the time, gives birth to a baby boy at the end of the first chapter.
- Uptown Girl: Dinnie's mother was this to her father. It's Deconstructed a bit, as it becomes clear that as much as he loves her, he's never really comfortable with her background or her family.
- With Friends Like These...: Lila isn't much of a friend to Dinnie, mainly using her as a sounding board for her venting, and frequently snapping at Dinnie when Dinnie tries to empathize with her. Despite this, Dinnie is so intrigued by Lila that she refuses to stop being friends with her.
