The new book is populated with characters pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape drugs or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", making it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the narrative. At the same time, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this seems a different type of work – documentarian, authentically narrative. But then it proves to be laden with the same dilemmas and approaches as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting intimate women's literature from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she now wants to try out new kinds of material, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing several time periods – all unable to escape their backgrounds. There is the narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, transitioning from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a town long abandoned by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader fond of polished prose of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the initial segment.
As a reader drawn to precise prose of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates minutiae, like the bucket that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, assisted by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this new voice could last out the book. The author states here that she resents the satisfaction readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach 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 Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a environment propelled by the rage and anxiety that underpins a political win. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day passed by the murdered individual with the killer and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
