The Four Spent the Day Together features protagonists seeking fresh starts, struggling to escape drugs or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into violence. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, the author herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, since this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. However it turns out to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Kraus started out as an visual artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It makes sense that she now wants to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that current political era turns intimate literature redundant.
Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning three generations – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, relocating from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. There is the narrative of the author, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a locality long abandoned by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of honed writing of the kind Kraus herself often avoids, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads who appreciates precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, assisted by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the middle section. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a society driven by the anger and fear that underpins a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "landlord" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she says that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day experienced by the deceased with the killer and his associates. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what transpired when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
