The same harmonica reaches a couple of orphaned brothers a few years later in America. The beautiful music inspires him and gives him the strength to help his father in a time of desperate need. A lover of music who dreams of one day becoming a conductor, Friedrich finds a harmonica marked with an M and which sounds like nothing else he heard before. The next morning Otto is rescued and his memory of that encounter on that fabled night soon fades….and all that remains is a mysterious prophecy and a harmonica.ĭecades later in Germany, Friedrich is a young German boy whose scarred face sets him apart – and on the wrong size of a Nazi party that worships perfection. Alone and scared, Otto meets three sisters who have been cursed to roam the forest until a time comes where they are freed to return to their family. It opens with a young boy named Otto as he gets lost in the woods near his house.

Then I read the blurb and saw that the author was an award-winning Hispanic author and that made me all the more curious. Why did I read this book: I was browsing at Barnes & Noble and came across this book and was struck by how beautiful the cover was – I had not heard of it, or seen any reviews to that point. The result is an impassioned, uplifting, and virtuosi tour de force that will resound in your heart long after the last note has been struck. Richly imagined and masterfully crafted, ECHO pushes the boundaries of genre and form, and shows us what is possible in how we tell stories. And ultimately, pulled by the invisible thread of destiny, their suspenseful solo stories converge in an orchestral crescendo. All the children face daunting challenges: rescuing a father, protecting a brother, holding a family together. Lost and alone in a forbidden forest, Otto meets three mysterious sisters and suddenly finds himself entwined in a puzzling quest involving a prophecy, a promise, and a harmonica.ĭecades later, Friedrich in Germany, Mike in Pennsylvania, and Ivy in California each, in turn, become interwoven when the very same harmonica lands in their lives.

Music, magic, and a real-life miracle meld in this genre-defying masterpiece from storytelling maestro Pam Muñoz Ryan. Echo is a novel of great ambition, with four historical settings, different characters and stories in a planned symphony that doesn’t quite sound perfect when it all comes together in the end.

Echo ryan book