The new book is populated with protagonists pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the story. And yet, the author herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, since this presents as a new kind of book – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
The writer was originally an artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a maverick maker who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to other people's stories, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing redundant.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, relocating from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. There is the account of Kraus, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to polished prose of the sort Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As someone who reads who appreciates precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for trivial aspects, like the pail that the young Catt 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 replies, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the second segment. Catt is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world propelled by the hostility and dread that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what transpired when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, mooching around getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
