This latest work centers on characters chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the story. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, since this seems a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it turns out to be filled with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as past novels.
From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work
Kraus started out as an creative who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating intimate women's literature from abjection into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style infused into the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a renegade artist who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It follows that she currently desires to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a time when she states that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative redundant.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – all unable to escape their backgrounds. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, transitioning from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to polished prose of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the initial segment.
Being a reader drawn to precise prose of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the first section. It possesses a fresh level of observation that allows space for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt frees from the ice at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works returns in the central part. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a environment fueled by the anger and fear that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
