This latest work centers on characters chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the text. At the same time, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, because this presents as a different type of work – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. However it turns out to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as earlier books.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting confessional female writing from humiliation into rebellion. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she presently aims to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing multiple eras – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, transitioning from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the type the author herself often avoids, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the first section.
As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the opening segment. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, assisted by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels returns in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment fueled by the anger and fear that underpins a political win. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, loitering getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
