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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals seeking fresh starts, struggling to escape drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, because this seems a different type of work – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be laden with the same dilemmas and styles as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic

The writer was originally an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from self-debasement into rebellion. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a maverick maker who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a time when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing redundant.

Several Eras, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a town long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort the author herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial segment.

As a reader who favors crafted language of the variety that the author tends to eschew, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for trivial aspects, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. The author states here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt Greene is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a world propelled by the anger and fear that underpins an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her professional designation altered from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par