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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with characters pursuing new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into violence. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", rendering it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, Kraus herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, since this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. However it turns out to be filled with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.

From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work

Kraus started out as an creative who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a renegade artist who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It makes sense that she now wants to try out different types of content, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative redundant.

Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning three generations – all unable to escape their backgrounds. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.

For this reader attracted to polished prose of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the style that the author often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the first section. There is a novel degree of detail that allows space for small details, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, assisted by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like sweet treats". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."

Frustration and Disruption

I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the unpolished style she shares with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels returns in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a society driven by the anger and fear that underpins Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".

The Homicide Account

So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the victim with the murderer and his friends. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par