The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with characters seeking new beginnings, struggling to escape drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", rendering it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. Meanwhile, Kraus herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, because this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. But then it proves to be laden with the recurring issues and styles as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Kraus was originally an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels missed the power and directness that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning three generations – all unable to escape their histories. There is the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to refined literature of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the opening part.
Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the variety that Kraus tends to eschew, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates trivial aspects, like the pail that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". She tells Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the unpolished style she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books comes back in the middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that powers an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. In a moment she says that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the victim with the killer and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
