The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it intentionally weary through recurring use. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the text. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, as this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. But then it turns out to be filled with the familiar conflicts and styles as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus was originally an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as missives to a distant beloved, elevating confessional female writing from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It follows that she currently desires to explore different types of content, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a moment when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – all unable to escape their pasts. The book includes the story of Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, moving from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise 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 her husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads who favors honed writing of the variety that Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It possesses a fresh level of observation that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she has in common with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a society driven by the anger and fear that powers an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the referenced day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what happened when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
