The new book features individuals pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this presents as a new kind of book – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. However it proves to be laden with the familiar conflicts and approaches as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
The writer was originally an creative who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels missed the power and directness that the epistolary style infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a maverick maker who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It makes sense that she presently aims to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to other people's stories, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing obsolete.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning multiple eras – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, relocating from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a town long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader attracted to refined literature of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the initial segment.
As a reader who appreciates precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the literary tone of the first section. There is a novel degree of detail that makes room for trivial aspects, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could last out the book. The author states here that she resents the enjoyment audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works returns in the central part. Catt is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse transitions between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the deceased with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, loitering fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
