The new book centers on characters pursuing new beginnings, trying to break free from substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the story. And yet, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, because this seems a novel form of writing – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it reveals itself to be laden with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a renegade artist who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It makes sense that she presently aims to explore fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she asserts that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning several time periods – all unable to escape their backgrounds. The book includes the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. There is the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a locality long abandoned by liberal ideals only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to polished prose of the sort Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the initial segment.
Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the start of the story, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the enjoyment audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society driven by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she states that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the referenced day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what transpired when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to go further into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
