The new book features individuals seeking fresh starts, trying to break free from addictions or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the text. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, because this appears a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. However it turns out to be filled with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Kraus began as an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting confessional female writing from abjection into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It follows that she now wants to explore fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she claims that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative redundant.
Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, moving from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the opening part.
As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the style that the author tends to eschew, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the start of the story, aided by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates 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 expected this different style could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works returns in the middle section. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a world driven by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she says that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the referenced day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, loitering having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
