Literacy Council Book Club Winter 2025

The Literacy Council Book Club is organized by Catherine Coundjeris, who volunteers in many roles with the Literacy Council including as an instructor, ESL coordinator, and co-editor of the council’s literary magazine Reflections: Voices of English Learners. The club meets twice a year, in winter and summer. 

The Winter book club met for four sessions and engaged in lively discussions about the powerful novel The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah. Set in the years of the Dust Bowl and Depression in the United States, it told the story of how a family experienced the deprivations caused by the nation’s largest environmental disaster of the 20th century. In their search for work and a better life, the family migrated from their home in Texas to California. What they found there was bigotry, injustice, and violence. The story reveals shameful flaws in the American Dream. But it also is a moving depiction of the resilience of the human spirit. 

Through Zoom meetings, club members examined the many aspects of this award-winning book and its relevance to life in America today. The gathering included tutor Jill and students Y R., Rosilene, Jamila, Natta, and Maria. 

In comments after the meeting, students shared a lot of enthusiasm for Hannah’s story. They were surprised to learn about the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression and what happened in America at that time. They also agreed that belonging to the book club was a great learning experience for them. 

Rosilene said: “Reading and discussing The Four Winds as a group was an eye opener for me. Not only because I have read for the first time a historical fiction book in English, but because I have learned more about what people have endured during the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl, a story [that had been] unknown to me. Once again, it is a pleasure to be a student at the Literacy Council of Frederick.” 

She also said the book club has encouraged her to read other books in English: “I am reading a book, The Father’s Tale, and I have found some similarities between the main character and The Four Winds character, Elsa. When I read about his illness, rheumatic fever, that he had when he was a teenager and how it affected his life forever, I remembered Elsa. He stayed in bed for two years. During this time, he dived in the books and became an introspective boy, and, in the future, a quiet, silent and introspective bookseller, husband and father. I am happy to be able to make some kind of connections between readings, even though they have different styles and themes. Thank you for helping me to amplify my literary view.” 

Another student, Y.R had this thoughtful response: “The Dust Bowl came to be because of the years of drought and overused land, which caused people to become distraught, poverty stricken, and suffer from dust pneumonia. Elsa decided to drive over a thousand miles to migrate with her two young children to California in search of a better life, but the family had to endure not only hardship but also discrimination against migrant workers in California. She sided with migrant workers to fight for fair pay, was shot, and died. She was a warrior. Loretta, her daughter, brought her mother back home to Lonesome Tree, Texas, and buried her. Elsa’s strong self-belief and endurance were admirable. Some of us in the book club were surprised to read about such an event of discrimination against its people that happened in America. For others, it was a refreshing memory of survival and resilience.” 

Jamila had this to say: “I was very surprised and depressed to know about the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression, but I liked the story told in this historical fiction of the character Elsa, who struggled, and suffered with her two children during that period.” 

Natta S. was enthusiastic about the book: “It was a great pleasure to read this book, it holds all my attention from the first to the last page. I was going through the pages, sympathizing with the heroine’s life: her love, her hurts, the birth of her children, her fear for their lives, her fight, her empathy and her bravery. The bravery of a poor, unattractive women, who turned out to be a real warrior.” 

Only after finishing this book, I looked at the title. What does the title mean? What does it say to me? In Western culture four winds represent movements, universal change, developing, but also a dead storm, a hurricane that could catch you and tear you apart. That is what happened to the heroine. She got killed while fighting for her children’s lives and the fair life for all people “of her kind,” becoming a woman she was always dreamt to be: beautiful, loved, and brave. 

I highly recommend this book to everyone who is interested in American history as well as a thrilling read. 

Our tutor Jill said this about the book club experience: “Catherine and book club members, I was grateful to read this book that illustrated human need and the complexity of life no one has the ability to predict or control. At this point in history, the similar themes made for great and wide-ranging discussions that sparked my thinking about the United States and immigration, and whether the migrants are U.S. citizens or from other countries. I appreciated the perspectives shared from your experiences coming to the U.S.” 

The week following the club’s final meeting, everyone met at Delizia Café. We enjoyed fellowship and continued our discussion of The Four Winds, reflecting on its literary merit. We learned that the author, Kristin Hannah, is a prolific writer whose book, The Nightingale, is highly acclaimed. The conversation was wide-ranging, and all the students were very enthusiastic about gathering in person. We also discussed possible future books for the club. 

We have been holding the Book Club meetings for several years now, and have read such books as The Distance Between Us: Memoir by Reyna Grande, Enrique’s Journeys by Sonia Nazario, A Revolution Is Not a Dinner Party by Ying Chang Compestine, The Kite Fighters by Linda Sue Parks, All You Can Ever Know by Nicole Chung, and Christi Lefteri’s Songbirds and The Beekeeper of Aleppo. We also read the anthologies Coming of Age in the 21st Century, edited by Mary Frosch, and Coming of Age Around the World, edited by Mary Frosch and Faith Adiele. We are open to suggestions for our next Book Club session, which will start in June/July during the summer break. Both tutors and students are welcome, but space is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. An official date will be announced in an upcoming class schedule for the summer session.