The new book features individuals chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, since this presents as a novel form of writing – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Kraus started out as an artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, elevating intimate women's literature from abjection into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she now wants to explore fresh narrative sources, turning outward to other people's stories, at a period in which she claims that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing obsolete.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing multiple eras – all unable to escape their histories. We encounter the tale of Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, moving from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to refined literature of the type the author herself often avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the first section. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for minutiae, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a nice toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this new voice could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books reasserts itself in the central part. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that powers an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she states that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her social media opponents would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his associates. Kraus has excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what occurred as Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, loitering having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
