This latest work is populated with protagonists pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into violence. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", rendering it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the story. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Kraus began as an visual artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a renegade artist who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to try out new kinds of material, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that current political era turns intimate literature redundant.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning multiple eras – each trapped by their pasts. There is the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, relocating from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the kind Kraus tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the first section.
Being a reader who favors precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, aided by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this fresh tone could continue through the novel. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the central part. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting her husband control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the deceased with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
