The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing fresh starts, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", rendering it intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. At the same time, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, as this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and styles as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Kraus started out as an creative who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels lacked the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a maverick maker who had become a major property owner, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It follows that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that current political era turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their pasts. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
As a reader fond of polished prose of the type the author herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the narrative style of the opening part.
As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. There is a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the enjoyment audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the unpolished style she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works comes back in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the anger and fear that powers a political win. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her occupation changed from "writer" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Killing Story
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what happened when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
