The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals pursuing new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the story. And yet, she is embarking on her personal new beginning, as this presents as a new kind of book – documentarian, authentically narrative. Yet it turns out to be packed with the recurring issues and approaches as earlier books.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Kraus began as an artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming personal female narrative from humiliation into defiance. She kept producing books, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position 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 try out fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing redundant.
Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their histories. The book includes the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, moving from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to honed writing of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the initial segment.
As someone who reads who appreciates precise prose of the variety that Kraus tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. There is a novel degree of detail that allows space for trivial aspects, like the pail that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a society driven by the rage and anxiety that powers a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her listed profession modified from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she states that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what happened when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed 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 boyfriend a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
