This latest work centers on characters chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" recur in the text. And yet, the author herself seems to be making her own fresh start, because this appears a new kind of book – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. However it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and styles as earlier books.
From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic
Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she presently aims to try out new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a time when she claims that current political era turns intimate literature obsolete.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. The book includes the narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, relocating from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a community largely deserted by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader drawn to refined literature of the kind the author herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors honed writing of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the container that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the start of the story, assisted by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the unpolished style she echoes from her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the anger and fear that powers a political win. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her occupation changed from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. In a moment she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the deceased with the killer and his associates. Kraus has 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 offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
