The new book features characters chasing after new beginnings, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this appears a different type of work – observational, truly literary. Yet it proves to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature obsolete.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering three generations – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to polished prose of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.
As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the style that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that makes room for minutiae, like the pail that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's story with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the enjoyment audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. The protagonist is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a environment propelled by the hostility and dread that drives a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the referenced day spent by the victim with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
