The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with protagonists pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape drugs or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this seems a different type of work – documentarian, truly literary. But then it turns out to be laden with the same dilemmas and styles as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Kraus started out as an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to explore new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that current political era makes confessional writing redundant.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning multiple eras – all unable to escape their pasts. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, transitioning from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the character of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a community mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader fond of polished prose of the type Kraus often avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads who appreciates precise prose of the variety that the author often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the first section. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the bucket that the young Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this fresh tone could last out the book. The author states here that she resents the pleasure readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books reasserts itself in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a world driven by the anger and fear that powers an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what occurred as the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
