The Four Spent the Day Together features characters seeking new beginnings, struggling to escape drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into violence. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", rendering it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, since this seems a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. However it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as earlier books.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus started out as an creative who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels missed the power and directness that the correspondence format infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a renegade artist who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It is logical that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she states that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing multiple eras – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the story of characters Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the guise of Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As a reader drawn to honed writing of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for small details, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". She tells the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this new voice could last out the book. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books comes back in the second segment. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a society driven by the rage and anxiety that powers an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. At one point she says that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the nation that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the referenced day spent by the deceased with the killer and his associates. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what happened when Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. 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 murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to go further into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
