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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on protagonists chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind addictions or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the story. Meanwhile, the author herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, as this appears a different type of work – observational, truly literary. But then it proves to be packed with the same dilemmas and approaches as her previous works.

From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus began as an visual artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting intimate women's literature from abjection into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the correspondence format brought to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that current political era makes confessional writing unnecessary.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning multiple eras – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort Kraus typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the initial segment.

Being a reader who appreciates honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the container that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the opening of the book, aided by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between two different states, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a world propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she states that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the victim with the murderer and his companions. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, loitering getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par