An aspiring composer, he has a large, red birthmark on his face that causes him problems in a Germany where racial purity reigns supreme. The first part of the book takes place in Trossingen, Germany, where Friedrich Schmidt struggles with his physical appearance during the rise of Nazism. They entrust him with an enchanted harmonica: if he passes it on, and it eventually saves someone’s life, they will be freed from captivity.

Lost in the forest, Otto is saved by the girls from that fairytale, Eins, Zwei, and Drei. The books begins with a prologue that introduces both a fairytale, and a scene of a young boy, Otto, reading that fairy tale as he hides in the forest, during a game of hide-and-seek.

The harmonica passes hands between Friedrich Schmidt, Mike Flannery, and Ivy Maria Lopez, and eventually makes its way into the hands of Kenneth Yamamoto, a soldier whose life it saves during World War II. In each locale, the harmonica finds its way into the hands of a talented young musician who finds him or herself in need of courage and comfort in the face of personal upheaval that reflects the larger inequality and change in their social context. involvement in World War II and the internment of Japanese Americans, it examines the social issues of the period through the lives of young people. Covering the rise of Nazism in Germany, the tail end of the Great Depression in the United States, and the beginning of U.S. Echo is a young-adult novel about the power of music to unite individuals across time, and even save lives: the wide-reaching novel follows an enchanted harmonica to 1933 in Germany, 1934 in Pennsylvania, and 1942 in California, before uniting the characters we meet along the way at Carnegie Hall in 1951.

Echo pam munoz