This latest work is populated with characters seeking clean slates, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into conflict. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", rendering it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the story. At the same time, she is embarking on her personal new beginning, because this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, authentically narrative. Yet it reveals itself to be filled with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from abjection into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels missed the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a maverick maker who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to experiment with fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she states that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.
Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering several time periods – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
As a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort the author herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads drawn to honed writing of the style that Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening segment. There is a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she resents the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she shares with her hero Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works returns in the middle section. Catt Greene is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between two different states, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society propelled by the anger and fear that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "property owner" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing 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 see".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the referenced day passed by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what happened when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
