This latest work centers on characters pursuing fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into conflict. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, as this appears a novel form of writing – observational, authentically narrative. However it proves to be packed with the familiar conflicts and styles as earlier books.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from abjection into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It is logical that she now wants to explore new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature redundant.
Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering several time periods – all unable to escape their pasts. There is the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the character of Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a locality long abandoned by liberal ideals only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to polished prose of the sort the author herself often avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.
As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that the author tends to eschew, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the first section. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for minutiae, like the bucket that the young Catt frees from the ice at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this fresh tone could continue through the novel. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her hero Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books comes back in the second segment. Catt Greene is attempting to do up 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 her spouse cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a environment fueled by the rage and anxiety that powers an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised 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 responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
