When we tipped this book off the shelf at the library, it landed with a "thunk!" in the book bag. It's a hefty read -- 587 pages!
But just like with Tristan Strong, our family really loves reeeaaaally long books, so it was an instant hit. It doesn't hurt that my two kiddos study violin, as well, and could fill in some of the taken-for-granted "musical" elements of the book from their performance experiences.
Echo is the story of how a harmonica brings together the right people at the right time to save their lives, although you don't really know that when you start reading. In the process, it frees three princesses bound by a witch's curse. It is intricately plotted and a joy to read.
It starts with a little boy, Otto, in the 1860s. To while away the time while playing hide-and-seek, he pulls open a book he bought from a Gypsy, "The Thirteenth Harmonica of Otto Messenger." By the time he's come to the end, the game is over and he's hopelessly lost -- until the princesses of the tale appear and ask him to read the tale to them. It's the first time you come across its strange rhyming prophecy, and you know more is to come, because the rest of the pages are still blank.
Now, it helps to know that a harmonica is a wind instrument, made by blowing air across a wooden reed, making it a "woodwind," as opposed to a "horn" -- like a trumpet or French horn. It is also often referred to as a "harp," sometimes a "French harp" or a "mouth organ." But make no mistake, it's not a stringed harp, nor is it an organ, with keys that hit pipes and use air to project the notes and are (mostly) played in churches.
Otto, the little boy, has a harmonica in his pocket, as well as the book, as he's reading to the princesses. Now, harmonicas were invented in the 1820s, so this would have been a relatively inexpensive, compact and sturdy instrument for a child to have, compared to others like a violin.
Each princess plays it, and their spirits are taken out of the enchanted place and transferred to the harmonica.
Just from this you can decipher most, if not all, of the prophecy, but how it plays out, across three lifetimes, is an amazing tale.
Friedrich Schmidt loses everything on the eve of WWII in Germany -- his big sister, Elisabeth, his father who played cello and worked in the harmonica factory with his Uncle Gunter -- in order for the harmonica to end up, purchased and packed off to it's next owner...
Mike Flannery and his little brother, Frankie, in The Bishop's Home for Friendless and Destitute Children in the US, where they play piano and impress Mr. Golding, who takes the boys from the orphanage so they can become wards of Mrs. Sturbridge, who needs to adopt one of them to fulfill the terms of her father's will and inherit his fortune.
Mike quickly susses out that she's not interested in adopting him, so he formulates a plan -- to purchase a harmonica from a catalog, learn to play it and run away and join the Philadelphia Harmonica Band for boys ages 9 to 14. When he plays it, he hears echos of a cello, but he masters the instrument, practicing hard and even winning a spot in the band.
But as he's running away, on the way out, he falls from a tree, and the story moves on to ...
Ivy Maria Lopez, who lives outside Fresno and plays harmonica and has to move when her father loses his job about a year into the United States' involvement in WWII. He takes a new job nearer Los Angeles as caretaker of a farm and property of an Asian-American farmer, a Mr. Yamamoto, after he's been rounded up and placed in a Japanese internment camp.
She and her family fight an attempt by a neighboring land owner to take over the property, by discovering Mr. Yamamoto's secret room of musical instruments.
When the neighbor's son is shipped off to WWII, Ivy hands him the harmonica, and it passes to...
Kenny Ward.
I won't spoil the ending, but it is an amazing example of a denouement that brings all the strings of the tale together in an amazing weave of story and poignant emotion and music, so much beautiful music.
And the princesses? Are they ever set free?
Read, enjoy, and find out how it ends!
