The new book features characters seeking new beginnings, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the story. And yet, Kraus herself seems to be making her own fresh start, as this seems a new kind of book – observational, truly literary. But then it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and styles as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus began 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 intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels missed the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style brought to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a time when she claims that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing several time periods – all unable to escape their backgrounds. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a locality mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader drawn to polished prose of the type the author herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the first section.
Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. There is a novel degree of detail that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this different style could persist to the end. The author states here that she resents the satisfaction audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her idol Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a environment fueled by the hostility and dread that drives Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the titular day experienced by the victim with the killer and his associates. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, wandering about fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
