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The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", making it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the narrative. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, because this seems a novel form of writing – fact-based, truly literary. But then it proves to be packed with the familiar conflicts and styles as past novels.

From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It makes sense that she now wants to explore new kinds of material, turning outward to other people's stories, at a period in which she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.

Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning several time periods – each trapped by their backgrounds. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.

From my perspective as a reader drawn to refined literature of the kind Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the literary tone of the opening part.

Being a reader who favors crafted language of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the first section. It possesses a novel degree of detail that allows space for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."

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 resents the enjoyment readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her hero author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books reasserts itself in the second segment. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a environment propelled by the hostility and dread that drives Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her occupation changed from "writer" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she states that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".

The Homicide Account

So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the victim with the killer and his companions. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what occurred as a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, loitering getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses 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 Brittney herself, who gains dimension partly through Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par