This latest work features protagonists chasing after fresh starts, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "new beginning", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" recur in the narrative. At the same time, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, because this seems a different type of work – observational, authentically narrative. But then it turns out to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
The writer started out as an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It is logical that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a time when she claims that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing obsolete.
Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing multiple eras – all unable to escape their histories. There is the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, transitioning from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. There is the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to refined literature of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the literary tone of the first section.
As someone who reads who favors crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the pail that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, assisted by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this new voice could last out the book. The author states here that she is annoyed by the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the central part. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between two different states, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the rage and anxiety that underpins a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her online critics would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what occurred as the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
