Hollis is Lindsey’s mother. She runs the Gutshot textile factory and takes in Colin and Hassan on their road trip. Lindsey is often frustrated by her mother’s attempts to get her to go to college out of town. By the end of the novel, it is clear that Hollis is doing everything she can to save Gutshot, but that the town is likely to die soon because the textile factory is doing poorly. Hollis wants her daughter to leave because she wants her to have a future outside of her declining hometown.
Hollis Wells Quotes in An Abundance of Katherines
The An Abundance of Katherines quotes below are all either spoken by Hollis Wells or refer to Hollis Wells. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 7
Quotes
Like it or not, Colin thought, road trips have destinations.
Related Characters:
Colin Singleton, Hassan Harbish, Hollis Wells
Related Themes:
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Explanation and Analysis:
No longer a prodigy, not yet a genius – but still a smartypants.
Related Characters:
Colin Singleton, Hassan Harbish, Lindsey Lee Wells, Hollis Wells
Related Themes:
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Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 19
Quotes
“It’s funny, what people will do to be remembered.”
“Well, or to be forgotten, because someday no one will know who’s really buried there. Already a lot of kids at school and stuff think the Archduke is really buried here, and I like that. I like knowing one story and having everyone else know another. That’s why those tapes we made are going to be so great one day, because they’ll tell stories that time has swallowed up or distorted or whatever.”
Related Characters:
Colin Singleton (speaker), Lindsey Lee Wells (speaker), Hollis Wells
Related Themes:
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Explanation and Analysis:
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Hollis Wells Character Timeline in An Abundance of Katherines
The timeline below shows where the character Hollis Wells appears in An Abundance of Katherines. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 7
...Hassan drop the act. Everyone laughs. The Other Colin (TOC) tells Lindsey that someone named Hollis would like Colin and Hassan. Colin watches Lindsey fake pout to get TOC to kiss...
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...of K-19. TOC kisses Lindsey and says he can’t go back to the store because Hollis is there, and he and Chase skipped out on work.
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Hollis, who is at the store when they arrive, turns out to be Lindsey’s mother. Hollis...
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On the way back to Hollis and Lindsey’s house, Hollis leads the way in a pink pickup truck with Hassan while...
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...but he’d never seen one in the wild, and didn’t really care to.” Colin follows Hollis’s pink truck up a hill to a huge, pink house. Inside, Hollis tells Colin and...
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...Hassan, Colin reflects, is amazingly gifted with the ability to make people like him. At Hollis’s invitation, Hassan says grace. All he says is “Bismillah” because, as he says, “We are...
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After dinner, Hollis asks Colin how it felt to win KranialKidz because she recalls that he did not...
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Colin tells Hollis that he’s not qualified to do any work because he always spends his summers at...
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A while later, Hollis decides they should all play Scrabble. Lindsey is aghast that Colin is a genius but...
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...is no interrupting. She goes on to tell him that in eighth grade, she had Hollis help her re-make her image to be “all alternative” and “half-emo and half-goth and half-punk...
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Chapter 8
...a shower, and they discuss how the Wells family is strange. Hassan tells Colin that Hollis has a billion-dollar house but is asleep on the couch watching the Home Shopping Network....
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...Hassan changes the subject to breakfast. On the way down the stairs, Colin wonders why Hollis really wanted to hire them. Hassan jokes that he has a special bond with Hollis...
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...Today Show and Colin reads from a Lord Byron anthology he brought with him while Hollis gets ready. Lindsey asks him what he is reading. He holds it up, and she...
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Hollis comes downstairs and explains that the project the two boys will be helping with is...
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Lindsey, frustrated with Hollis’s tone with regard to her boyfriend, asks Hassan in the Hearse to drop her off...
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Chapter 9
...track of them time until Lindsey stands up to leave, asking Starnes if he wants Hollis to get him an air conditioner. He says she has already done well by him....
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...to see The Other Colin and then make themselves scarce so that she can tell Hollis later that they were driving around all afternoon. She teases Colin that it’s because she...
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...calling his parents. On the phone, he tells his father the truth about staying with Hollis. His father worries that he is too trusting. Colin protests that he survived seventeen years...
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Chapter 10
In the morning, Colin goes downstairs to find Hollis passed out on the couch and Hassan eating breakfast. Hassan shows Colin a note from...
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...they must be her friends if she trusts them not to rat her out to Hollis. “Almost by accident,” the narrator states, “and in just two days, Colin had made his...
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Chapter 11
The fifth night in Gutshot, Colin refuses Hassan, Lindsey, and even Hollis‘s attempts to get him to go out driving around with Hassan and Lindsey. Colin is...
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Chapter 12
Downstairs, Hollis is dressed in a pink pantsuit because she is going to the factory to check...
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...interviewees who assume he is her boyfriend. The “oldsters” seem to have great affection for Hollis, and Lindsey seems to be “some kind of rock star” among them. He learns from...
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In the Hearse, Lindsey is perplexed by why Hollis would sell land. She is sure they are not hurting for money and says her...
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Chapter 13
Colin, Lindsey, and Hassan go back to Hollis’s house early. She is on the phone when they arrive and hangs up to tell...
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...Hassan kiss a girl “who had to have been Homecoming Queen.” Lindsey calls out to Hollis that they might be out late for “Hot sex and all,” and Hollis says to...
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...individuals represented by the variables are. Lindsey also says she is trying to get on Hollis’s good side by making better friends with Colin because she needs to find out what...
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...get his attention. She tells him that part of the reason she is mad about Hollis selling the land is that her secret hideout is there. She asks if he wants...
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Chapter 14
...but got none in return. She returned home feeling horrible and refusing to talk to Hollis about it. Out her bedroom window, she saw TOC run up to the door with...
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...be. Anyway, Colin thinks, she’s a Lindsey. They walk in the house quietly and overhear Hollis on the phone, talking about leaving something out for the garbage men to pick up....
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On the stairs, Lindsey and Colin conspire about Hollis’s phone call. It must have something to do with the warehouse, Colin says, because that’s...
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Chapter 18
...Colin up on Thursday morning, telling him they are going to Memphis to spy on Hollis. Colin pretends to be sleepy, but he is alert as soon as Lindsey jumps on...
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...himself as the director of operations for Gutshot Textiles, recognizes Lindsey because she looks like Hollis. He says that Hollis will be there soon and walks the three teenagers back to...
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Hollis is surprised to see Lindsey there. Lindsey begins angrily demanding if she is trying to...
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Lindsey demands why, if the company is so broke, Hollis hired Colin and Hassan to do a made-up job. Hollis explains that the job is...
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Lindsey rides with Hollis on the way back to Gutshot, leaving Colin and Hassan alone together in the Hearse....
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Chapter 19
Colin and Hassan arrive home after Hollis and Lindsey. Hollis tells them Lindsey went to stay overnight with her friend Janet. She...
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...Lindsey in the cave, and she confirms that she was giving him a code through Hollis. Colin sits beside her, and she turns out the light she has briefly illuminated for...
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...her life with him. She was crying on the way home in the car with Hollis because she realized she only ever liked the idea of being his girlfriend. She worries...
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...old-timers know. Dinzanfar wanted his grave to marked as such, and a couple years ago, Hollis put up the sign on the road to bring in revenue with tours. Ironically, what...
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