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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on characters seeking fresh starts, struggling to escape substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. The author often employs the phrase "fresh start", rendering it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the text. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this seems a different type of work – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. But then it turns out to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as past novels.

From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book

Chris Kraus started out as an creative who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into assassination. She kept producing books, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the power and directness that the correspondence format brought to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It follows that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a time when she states that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative obsolete.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – all unable to escape their pasts. We encounter the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a locality mostly forsaken by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.

From my perspective as a reader drawn to refined literature of the kind Kraus herself often avoids, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the first section.

Being a reader who favors precise prose of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was won over by the literary tone of the first section. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that accommodates small details, like the pail that the young Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."

Frustration and Disruption

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. The author states here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, 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. Catt is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the anger and fear that powers a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".

The Killing Story

So then we come to the actual killing – and the referenced day experienced by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what happened when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par