This latest work centers on characters chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the text. And yet, she seems to be making her own fresh start, because this presents as a new kind of book – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it proves to be packed with the familiar conflicts and approaches as her previous works.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
The writer began as an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, elevating personal female narrative from humiliation into assassination. She kept producing books, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a time when she states that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature redundant.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their backgrounds. The book includes the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader fond of refined literature of the kind Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the opening part.
As a reader drawn to precise prose of the kind that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial part. There is a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels returns in the second segment. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the anger and fear that drives a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the killer and his companions. The author possesses excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, wandering about fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
