The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals seeking new beginnings, struggling to escape substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. The author frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", making it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the story. Meanwhile, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, as this presents as a novel form of writing – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. However it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus was originally an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as missives to a distant beloved, elevating intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to try out new kinds of material, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning three generations – each trapped by their pasts. There is the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband a man named Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader fond of refined literature of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the narrative style of the initial segment.
As someone who reads who appreciates crafted language of the variety that the author usually avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for small details, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, assisted by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this new voice could continue through the novel. The author states here that she dislikes the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she says that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the referenced day spent by the victim with the murderer and his companions. The author possesses excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what happened when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, wandering about getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par
