This latest work features protagonists pursuing new beginnings, struggling to escape substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", making it willfully cynical through recurring use. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, since this appears a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. However it proves to be packed with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus started out as an creative who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming confessional female writing from humiliation into assassination. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she presently aims to explore fresh narrative sources, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature obsolete.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, relocating from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a town mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader fond of refined literature of the sort Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section.
As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the style that the author often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, assisted by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the second segment. The protagonist is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help her husband curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the rage and anxiety that powers a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her occupation changed from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. The author possesses excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, wandering about fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
