This latest work centers on protagonists chasing after fresh starts, trying to break free from addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. Yet it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic
Kraus started out as an creative who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating confessional female writing from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a renegade artist who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to other people's stories, at a time when she states that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative obsolete.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a town mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to polished prose of the kind Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads who appreciates crafted language of the variety that Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial part. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works returns in the central part. Catt is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as her spouse transitions between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment driven by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her occupation changed from "writer" to "landlord" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. At one point she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes great source material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, loitering having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
