This latest work centers on individuals pursuing clean slates, attempting to leave behind addictions or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through recurring use. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the story. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, since this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. But then it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.
From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus began as an visual artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating confessional female writing from humiliation into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the power and directness that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It makes sense that she now wants to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she states that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing obsolete.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering three generations – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, transitioning from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. There is the narrative of the author, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
As a reader attracted to honed writing of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors precise prose of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the literary tone of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt frees from the ice at the opening of the book, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels comes back in the central part. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society fueled by the anger and fear that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her social media opponents would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the actual killing – and the titular day passed by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and details moment by moment what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, wandering about fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
