The new book centers on protagonists chasing after new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into violence. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through recurring use. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the narrative. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this seems a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. However it proves to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
The writer was originally an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating confessional female writing from humiliation into assassination. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a renegade artist who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that current political era turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing multiple eras – all unable to escape their backgrounds. We encounter the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to polished prose of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the kind that Kraus often disregards, I was won over by the literary tone of the first section. There is a fresh level of observation that makes room for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this different style could continue through the novel. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between two different states, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a environment fueled by the rage and anxiety that drives a political win. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. In a moment she says that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day with her companions, mooching around getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
