This latest work centers on characters pursuing fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into intentionally weary through its repetitions. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, because this seems a novel form of writing – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. Yet it proves to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as earlier books.
From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic
Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from self-debasement into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the power and directness that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a maverick maker who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their backgrounds. We encounter the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
For this reader fond of honed writing of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors precise prose of the variety that the author often disregards, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that allows space for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". She tells the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she resents the satisfaction readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she has in common with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works reasserts itself in the central part. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society driven by the hostility and dread that drives a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his friends. Kraus utilizes great source material, and details moment by moment what transpired when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, loitering fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with 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
