This latest work features characters chasing after fresh starts, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. At the same time, she is embarking on her individual reinvention, because this seems a new kind of book – observational, truly literary. However it proves to be packed with the recurring issues and styles as earlier books.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an artist who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into assassination. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels missed the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a maverick maker who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It makes sense that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a time when she asserts that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the story of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, relocating from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
As a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors precise prose of the style that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the first section. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus notes here that she resents the enjoyment audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the unpolished style she echoes from her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between two different states, unable to aid her husband curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a world propelled by the anger and fear that underpins Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned 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 United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day passed by the victim with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, wandering about getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who comes alive in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
