The new book centers on protagonists chasing after fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", making it deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. At the same time, she is embarking on her own fresh start, as this appears a different type of work – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
The writer began as an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She kept producing books, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the impact and rawness that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a period in which she claims that current political era renders personal narrative redundant.
Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning three generations – all unable to escape their histories. There is the narrative about Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a town largely deserted by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the kind the author herself often avoids, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the opening part.
Being a reader drawn to precise prose of the style that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that allows space for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this fresh tone could continue through the novel. The author states here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the middle section. Catt is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the victim with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what occurred as Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied 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 youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
