The new book features protagonists pursuing new beginnings, attempting to leave behind addictions or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the narrative. At the same time, she is embarking on her individual reinvention, as this appears a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus began as an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It follows that she now wants to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that current political era turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing three generations – all unable to escape their pasts. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
As a reader drawn to polished prose of the sort Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the opening part.
As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the start of the story, helped by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her hero Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the central part. Catt is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his friends. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what transpired when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day with her companions, loitering having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
