Good morning. My name is Pat and I'm a Trixieholic.

No, Trixie is not a brand name of alcohol. Neither is it a new drug fad. Trixie is an impetuous, adventurous, spunky and daring teenager. Trixie is Trixie Belden, the title character in a series of children's books published between 1948 and 1986.

If you're still wondering, "Who the heck is Trixie Belden?" you're probably not alone. With the series out of print for years, an entire generation of readers has been deprived from knowing Trixie Belden, a girl detective from the fictional town of Sleepyside-on-the-Hudson, N.Y., her best friend Honey Wheeler, and the five other teenagers who make up their "semi-secret club", the Bob-Whites of the Glen.

For some inexplicable reason, I spent two years completely enchanted by the stories of their adventures; reading and rereading them until the books quite literally disintegrated in my hands.

Summer of '61