The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals pursuing fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into conflict. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into intentionally weary through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the story. And yet, Kraus herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, as this appears a new kind of book – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it proves to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Kraus was originally an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming confessional female writing from abjection into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a maverick maker who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to explore fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a time when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the sort the author herself often avoids, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As a reader drawn to precise prose of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the container that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could last out the book. The author states here that she resents the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the unpolished style she has in common with her hero Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works returns in the central part. Catt is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a world driven by the anger and fear that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the killer and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to go further into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
