The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals chasing after clean slates, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the story. At the same time, the author herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, as this seems a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. Yet it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Kraus began as an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format infused into the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing redundant.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a community long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to refined literature of the type Kraus herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening part.
Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the first section. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she shares with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a world propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her professional designation altered from "author" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. In a moment she states that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day passed by the victim with the murderer and his associates. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
