The new book features protagonists chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the text. And yet, she seems to be making her personal new beginning, since this seems a different type of work – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. However it reveals itself to be filled with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
The writer was originally an artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, transforming confessional female writing from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels missed the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a period in which she asserts that current political era turns intimate literature redundant.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering three generations – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the story of Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
For this reader fond of honed writing of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the opening part.
As a reader drawn to honed writing of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the first section. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for small details, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
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 enjoyment audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world driven by the hostility and dread that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned 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 the United States that her social media opponents would not understand, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the deceased with the killer and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to go further into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
