🔗 Share this article

The new book is populated with protagonists chasing after new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. The author often employs the phrase "fresh start", making it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the text. At the same time, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this appears a new kind of book – documentarian, authentically narrative. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.

From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book

The writer was originally an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming confessional female writing from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It follows that she currently desires to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a time when she states that current political era makes confessional writing obsolete.

Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. The book includes the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, relocating from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the guise 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 account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a town largely deserted by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.

For this reader drawn to honed writing of the sort Kraus herself often avoids, I was captivated by the narrative style of the initial segment.

As a reader who favors honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the literary tone of the opening segment. There is a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the satisfaction audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a world driven by the hostility and dread that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "property owner" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she states that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the titular day passed by the deceased with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par