The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through recurring use. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the text. Meanwhile, she seems to be making her own fresh start, since this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, authentically narrative. Yet it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus was originally an artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from abjection into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It is logical that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature redundant.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. There is the narrative of the author, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a town mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to polished prose of the kind Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the first section.
As someone who reads who favors honed writing of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the literary tone of the first section. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the container that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this fresh tone could continue through the novel. The author states here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her hero Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the central part. Catt is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between two different states, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as her spouse cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that underpins an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "property owner" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she says that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day experienced by the victim with the killer and his companions. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
