The Multiplying Mysteries of Mount Ten adds up to middle school fun

Sadly it was our 9 year-old son who clued us into the pun that is clearly in the title of this book. “Daddy, it’s a book about a kid who accidentally goes to a math camp instead of art camp and it’s called The Multiplying Mysteries of Mount Ten. Mount ten?”, he said. Oh, mountain, Mount Ten, math camp, this is a clever pun that kids (or at least my kid) got before I did. I need some coffee.

The Multiplying Mysteries of Mount Ten reads like a summer camp based mystery that’s at home with Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys or some of their more modern contemporaries. As an adult, those two franchises are the first ones to pop into mind because this book blends the two and can be enjoyed by boys or girls equally. Granted the lead character in Mount Ten is Esther, a 12 year-old girl. However, the book is filled with enough gossip, mystery, adventure and upper elementary school conspiracy theories to keep anyone that aged involved. There are also the puzzles.

Esther was supposed to go to art camp, but somehow her stepdad gets the reservations mixed up and she’s going to Camp Archimedes. It’s also raining, storming so hard that the roads are closed due to flooding just after they arrive. This is some great weather for a mystery.

This camp is renowned for their puzzles. Some of the puzzles are challenging and there’s one that’s so dastardly that it’s never been solved. Set among this competitive background are a couple of disappearing people, some folks that the kids can’t trust and the huge mountains that frame the camp.

Those readers in upper elementary through middle school will enjoy The Multiplying Mysteries of Mount Ten. Think of those insane theories that this age can come up with. If you pass that house after 9PM without humming snakes will pop out from the ground. A murderer used to live in that house and you can still see their face in the kitchen window. These are the absurd urban legends that live in the imaginations of ages 9 and up and this book is right at home with them.

The disappearances that happen in the book and their reasons won’t resonate with older readers. However those younger readers will swear up and down that they’ve had friends who have gone missing like that too. At which point you, as the adult can challenge them to do one of the math riddles that the books posits.

We couldn’t solve the riddles in the book. However, author Krista Van Dolzer has a degree in Mathematics from Brigham Young University and kids (like ours), will certainly try to solve them. If they’re like ours they’ll get caught up with the pacing of the book and end up not solving them; but they’ll enjoy the book as a lively, fun book that’ll make them smile.