This latest work features characters chasing after new beginnings, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the text. And yet, Kraus herself seems to be making her own fresh start, as this appears a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Kraus started out as an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into rebellion. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the power and directness that the epistolary style imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It is logical that she currently desires to explore different types of content, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that current political era turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a locality mostly forsaken by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the sort Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the first section.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the style that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was won over by the literary tone of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, assisted by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this new voice could last out the book. The author states here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she shares with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between two different states, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the anger and fear that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she says that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the murderer and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what transpired when Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, loitering having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
