The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing new beginnings, trying to break free from drugs or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the story. Meanwhile, she is embarking on her own fresh start, because this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. However it proves to be laden with the familiar conflicts and styles as her previous works.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus began as an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, elevating intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It is logical that she currently desires to explore fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a moment when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering multiple eras – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, transitioning from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to polished prose of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was captivated by the narrative style of the opening part.
Being a reader who favors crafted language of the kind that the author usually avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. It possesses a novel degree of detail that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this new voice could last out the book. The author states here that she is annoyed by the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works comes back in the second segment. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between two different states, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a society fueled by the rage and anxiety that underpins Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "property owner" on a reference site. 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 exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the deceased with the killer and his friends. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, loitering getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
