The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals pursuing clean slates, trying to break free from addictions or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", making it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the story. At the same time, Kraus herself is embarking on her individual reinvention, since this appears a different type of work – documentarian, authentically narrative. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Kraus was originally an visual artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the power and directness that the correspondence format infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a renegade artist who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It makes sense that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. There is the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by progressive politics only a short distance from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the kind Kraus often avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself often disregards, I was won over by the literary tone of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, assisted by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a nice toy", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like piece candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the unpolished style she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the second segment. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that underpins a political win. There are several pages 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 care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the victim with the killer and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
