This latest work centers on individuals seeking fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, Kraus herself seems to be making her own fresh start, as this presents as a novel form of writing – fact-based, truly literary. However it turns out to be filled with the familiar conflicts and approaches as past novels.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
The writer was originally an visual artist who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating confessional female writing from self-debasement into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a renegade artist who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It makes sense that she currently desires to explore different types of content, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. We encounter the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a locality largely deserted by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to refined literature of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
Being a reader drawn to precise prose of the kind that Kraus tends to eschew, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the initial part. There is a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for minutiae, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, helped by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "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 inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the unpolished style she echoes from her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the central part. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a society propelled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her professional designation altered from "author" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. In a moment she states that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the victim with the murderer and his friends. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what occurred as a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
