The new book centers on protagonists seeking fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the text. Meanwhile, she is embarking on her own fresh start, since this presents as a new kind of book – observational, genuinely novelistic. However it proves to be packed with the familiar conflicts and styles as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
The writer was originally an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style infused into the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a maverick maker who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It makes sense that she now wants to explore fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she states that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. We encounter the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, transitioning from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to refined literature of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.
Being a reader drawn to crafted language of the style that the author usually avoids, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her hero Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the second segment. Catt is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the murder itself – and the referenced day experienced by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
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 audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who gains dimension partly through Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
