The Four Spent the Day Together features protagonists pursuing clean slates, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into violence. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the narrative. At the same time, the author herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, since this appears a different type of work – fact-based, authentically narrative. Yet it turns out to be packed with the recurring issues and styles as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus started out as an creative who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It makes sense that she now wants to explore new kinds of material, turning outward to other people's stories, at a time when she claims that current political era renders personal narrative redundant.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – each trapped by their histories. We encounter the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to refined literature of the kind Kraus herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads who favors crafted language of the kind that the author usually avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. There is a fresh level of observation that makes room for small details, like the bucket that the young Catt frees from the ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing 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 see".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the titular day passed by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partly through Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
