This latest work features individuals chasing after fresh starts, struggling to escape drugs or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, as this appears a different type of work – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it proves to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as past novels.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
Kraus started out as an visual artist who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, elevating intimate women's literature from self-debasement into rebellion. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels lacked the power and directness that the epistolary style imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a major property owner, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to other people's stories, at a period in which she claims that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing obsolete.
Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering multiple eras – all unable to escape their histories. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of polished prose of the kind Kraus often avoids, I was seduced by the narrative style of the first section.
As someone who reads who favors honed writing of the variety that the author often disregards, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It possesses a fresh level of observation that allows space for trivial aspects, like the pail that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the start of the story, assisted by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this fresh tone could persist to the end. The author states here that she resents the pleasure audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the rage and anxiety that underpins a political win. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what happened when Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
