The new book centers on protagonists seeking fresh starts, attempting to leave behind addictions or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into aggression. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the text. At the same time, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this appears a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. However it proves to be packed with the same dilemmas and approaches as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
The writer was originally an artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, converting personal female narrative from self-debasement into assassination. She kept producing books, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format brought to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a maverick maker who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It makes sense that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she states that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing unnecessary.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their backgrounds. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, transitioning from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband a man named Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.
For this reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the variety that the author often disregards, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for small details, like the pail that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this different style could continue through the novel. The author states here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the rage and anxiety that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she states that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the killer and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
