The new book centers on individuals seeking new beginnings, attempting to leave behind drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. Meanwhile, she seems to be making her own fresh start, as this seems a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be filled with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
The writer began as an creative who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, converting personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She kept producing books, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format brought to the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a renegade artist who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It is logical that she presently aims to experiment with fresh narrative sources, turning outward to other people's stories, at a time when she asserts that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature obsolete.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering several time periods – each trapped by their histories. The book includes the tale of Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, transitioning from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character 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 directionless individual by another in a locality largely deserted by progressive politics only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
As a reader drawn to refined literature of the type the author herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a nice toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she shares with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between two different states, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a world driven by the rage and anxiety that underpins a political win. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the deceased with the killer and his companions. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, mooching around getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who comes alive in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
