🔗 Share this article

The new book features protagonists chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, she seems to be making her individual reinvention, since this appears a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. However it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as her previous works.

From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work

The writer was originally an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, elevating confessional female writing from abjection into assassination. She kept producing books, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature obsolete.

Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing several time periods – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the narrative about Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a town long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.

From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the type Kraus typically rejects, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section.

Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this different style could last out the book. The author states here that she dislikes the enjoyment readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her idol Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works comes back in the second segment. The protagonist is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as her spouse cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the anger and fear that underpins an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her occupation changed from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. At one point she states that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even see".

The Homicide Account

So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day experienced by the deceased with the murderer and his friends. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par