The new book features individuals seeking new beginnings, trying to break free from drugs or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into violence. Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the narrative. At the same time, she seems to be making her personal new beginning, as this seems a different type of work – observational, authentically narrative. However it turns out to be packed with the recurring issues and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
The writer was originally an creative who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a maverick maker who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she presently aims to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative redundant.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their pasts. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband 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 cottage in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to polished prose of the kind Kraus often avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates minutiae, like the container that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this different style could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt Greene is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting her husband control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a world propelled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she states that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the titular day experienced by the deceased with the killer and his associates. Kraus has great source material, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
