This latest work features individuals seeking clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the text. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her own fresh start, as this presents as a different type of work – documentarian, truly literary. However it reveals itself to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Kraus was originally an creative who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into defiance. She kept producing books, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to external narratives, at a moment when she states that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, transitioning from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to honed writing of the type the author herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader drawn to crafted language of the style that Kraus often disregards, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. There is a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could last out the book. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the unpolished style she echoes from her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt Greene is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a society propelled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the titular day experienced by the deceased with the killer and his associates. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
