This latest work features characters pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the story. At the same time, she seems to be making her personal new beginning, since this presents as a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. Yet it turns out to be packed with the recurring issues and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Kraus was originally an visual artist who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to explore new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – all unable to escape their pasts. There is the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to refined literature of the type Kraus herself often avoids, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the literary tone of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels comes back in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting her husband control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a environment driven by the hostility and dread that powers a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems 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 social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
