an excellent story, particularly in the Overdrive audio version. Combining fairytale, short stories, and historical fiction, this is a fine example of story-for-stories sake. The book centers in a special harmonica and has, among it's themes, that of the power of music to help persevere, have hope, and bring lives together. The masterful audio rendition includes musical performances to bring this to relief. The story itself spans a variety of lives, dealing with topics from Nazi Germany to orphan life to American racial inequality. It offers a fairly typical fare of emotions that occasionally border on cliche, but it does so well, particularly in the audio version where the musical elements are certainly sufficient to breathe life into anything that tended towards dullness.