This latest work is populated with protagonists pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape drugs or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into violence. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", making it deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the narrative. And yet, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, because this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the recurring issues and approaches as her previous works.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
The writer started out as an visual artist who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with fresh narrative sources, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a period in which she states that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative obsolete.
Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning three generations – all unable to escape their backgrounds. The book includes the tale of Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, moving from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a locality mostly forsaken by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to honed writing of the type Kraus herself often avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section.
As someone who reads who appreciates honed writing of the style that Kraus often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like sweet treats". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works returns in the second segment. Catt Greene is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a society propelled by the anger and fear that powers a political win. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her professional designation altered from "author" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her online critics would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the referenced day passed by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to go further into her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
