The Happy Hollisters Series

Written for boys and girls between the ages of six and 12, The Happy Hollisters are wholesome books, with an accent on humor and good, clean fun. Integrity always pays off and right wins over wrong. Parents, grandparents, and teachers will love these books for their healthy celebration of life in simpler times. Kids will be thrilled with the fast-paced action and will not want to put them down. This is a perfect gift for the young listener in your life!  

A big fish contest at The Trading Post, the Hollisters’ sporting goods store, has everybody in Shoreham excited. After Pete catches a large fish with a tag on its tail, another adventure begins for the eager young detectives. When the children’s friend, Bobby Reed, disappears in a leaky old boat, the whole family helps in the search. A series of surprise discoveries lead the Hollisters on a hunt for Bobby on shore, and other adventures provide good times along the way.

Looking forward to a visit to Sea Gull Beach, the Happy Hollister children have a wonderful time giving a play about pirates and American sailors. Then, when they discover that a present they received from Uncle Russ, a lighthouse lamp, contains a real emerald, they are more eager than ever to get to Sea Gull Beach and find out where it came from.

Another exciting adventure for this happy family comes about through their new friend Indy Roades, a former baseball player and a Yumatan Indian. He tells them about his pueblo in the mountains of New Mexico, and his tribe’s lost turquoise mine. When Mr. Hollister hears that a store there, called The Chapparal, which sells silver trinkets and Yumatan articles, is closing down, he considers buying the goods for his own shop, The Trading Post. He decides to go to New Mexico to examine the stock, and takes his family along with him. 

While returning from New Mexico to the airport in their rented bus, the Hollister children stop to buy cowboy suits. Mr. Hollister, with an eye for items to sell in his store, The Trading Post, discovers the suits are designed by Marie Vega, the wife of an old college friend. Mr. Hollister contacts the Vegas and the whole Hollister family is invited to spend a few weeks on the Vega ranch. 

One day, the Hollister children saw their grandparents on television. The show was featuring dog sled races during a yearly Canadian Trappers’ Carnival. Since the elder Mr. and Mrs. Hollister run a winter resort called Snowflake Camp in Canada, the children thought it would be a wonderful idea to ask their grandparents if they could visit them over the Thanksgiving vacation when the next Carnival would be starting. No one had any idea, while waiting for the invitation to arrive, that Snowflake Camp would turn out to be the trail’s end of a mystery that started in Shoreham.

There is great activity in the Hollister household upon the arrival of Domingo, the donkey promised Sue in New Mexico. The excitement mounts higher with the discovery of a note attached to the donkey’s halter signed Y.I.F. So begins one of the two mysteries that run through this book.

The purchase of a houseboat sends the Hollister family to Circus Island, the home of the Sunshine Circus in Florida. Pam enters her dog Zip in a dog show where the theft of two French poodles and an injury to Zip begin a mystery which has some connection with the Hollisters’ destination in Florida. Through clues, such as a handbill announcing the Wizard Circus and the disappearance of another dog, they learn the thief’s activities are far more sinister than anyone had at first suspected. 

In The Happy Hollisters and the Secret Fort (the ninth audiobook in the Happy Hollisters series), a missing letter is the key to the whereabouts of Fort Freedom, the stockade that disappeared after the Revolutionary War. The fort is located somewhere within the boundaries of Shoreham, and has been sought after for many years, not only for its historic value, but for the gold supposed to be hidden there by the early settlers.

Everyone is quite enthusiastic when the suggestion is made that a merry-go-round be one of the main attractions at Shoreham’s Lincoln School Fair. Pete Hollister volunteers for the job, in spite of the obvious difficulties of the task. It turns out to be more difficult than was at first supposed, however, for Pete finds he is competing with a professional carnival that has recently arrived in town. Pete’s job goes quite well at the start, and he is delighted when he locates two merry-go-rounds which can be used free of charge, since the fair is a charity function.

When Mr. Stone died he had only one relative, his grandson, Graham. Graham had been informed that he was to have the one thing of value on the farm, known only as “mystery boy.” Unfortunately, no one knew who or what “mystery boy” was. The Hollisters, therefore, were quite surprised to find that the hobbyhorse they purchased at the sale held the key to the identity of this strange bequest.

When Mr. Hollister’s sport and toy store, The Trading Post, is robbed, his main concern is for his invention, a new type of collapsible canoe. He is therefore surprised to discover that a Geiger counter and a couple of pickaxes are the only missing items. After putting the problem of the theft in the hands of the police, the family turns to the matter of testing the canoe.