The new book is populated with individuals pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the text. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, as this appears a novel form of writing – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting intimate women's literature from humiliation into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the power and directness that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to explore different types of content, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing unnecessary.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, relocating from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a locality mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to polished prose of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the initial segment.
As someone who reads drawn to honed writing of the kind that the author usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she resents the satisfaction audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the unpolished style she echoes from her hero Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a environment propelled by the rage and anxiety that powers an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she says that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the deceased with the killer and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent 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 a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
