The Four Spent the Day Together features characters chasing after new beginnings, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this appears a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it reveals itself to be packed with the recurring issues and styles as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus was originally an visual artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to try out new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a time when she claims that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative redundant.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing three generations – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the narrative about Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of honed writing of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the kind that the author often disregards, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for small details, like the container that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this fresh tone could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the enjoyment readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her hero Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books reasserts itself in the central part. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between two different states, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society propelled by the hostility and dread that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "author" to "property owner" on a reference site. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she says that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day spent by the deceased with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what happened when Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
