This latest work centers on characters chasing after clean slates, trying to break free from drugs or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the narrative. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. However it reveals itself to be filled with the same dilemmas and styles as her previous works.
From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus started out as an creative who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to experiment with new kinds of material, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative redundant.
Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. There is the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. There is the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by progressive politics only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to honed writing of the kind Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the first section.
Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the style that the author often disregards, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the pail that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the opening of the book, helped by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the deceased with the perpetrator and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
