The new book centers on individuals pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", rendering it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the story. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this appears a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it reveals itself to be packed with the recurring issues and styles as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
The writer started out as an creative who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels missed the power and directness that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a maverick maker who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to external narratives, at a time when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – each trapped by their histories. We encounter the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to polished prose of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the kind that Kraus often disregards, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that allows space for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this new voice could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a world propelled by the hostility and dread that drives Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she states that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, mooching around fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who comes alive in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
