This latest work is populated with characters chasing after fresh starts, trying to break free from addictions or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the story. At the same time, Kraus herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, because this presents as a novel form of writing – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from self-debasement into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to other people's stories, at a time when she states that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative redundant.
Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to polished prose of the type the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors precise prose of the variety that the author tends to eschew, I was seduced by the literary tone of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this different style could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she has in common with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels returns in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment driven by the anger and fear that underpins an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day spent by the deceased with the murderer and his companions. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
