The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with characters chasing after new beginnings, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", making it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the story. And yet, she is embarking on her own fresh start, since this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it reveals itself to be laden with the recurring issues and approaches as earlier books.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Kraus started out as an visual artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She continued writing, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It is logical that she presently aims to try out different types of content, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative redundant.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the tale of Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a town long abandoned by progressive politics only a short distance from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the sort Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section.
As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening segment. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a nice toy", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works returns in the second segment. The protagonist is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between two different states, failing to help her husband control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a society fueled by the anger and fear that powers Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his companions. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what occurred as a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
