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The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals seeking fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the text. At the same time, Kraus herself is embarking on her own fresh start, as this presents as a new kind of book – observational, genuinely novelistic. However it reveals itself to be packed with the same dilemmas and approaches as past novels.

From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book

Chris Kraus started out as an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form brought to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a time when she states that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.

Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the narrative about Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by liberal ideals only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the first section.

Being a reader who favors crafted language of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial part. There is a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she resents the satisfaction readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between two different states, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as her spouse cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that powers an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the murder itself – and the referenced day passed by the deceased with the perpetrator and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.

Fascination and Incompletion

Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par