This latest work features characters seeking new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into aggression. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this appears a new kind of book – observational, truly literary. But then it turns out to be packed with the same dilemmas and approaches as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus was originally an visual artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a time when she asserts that current political era makes confessional writing unnecessary.
Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their pasts. There is the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community long abandoned by liberal ideals only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to polished prose of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the initial segment.
As a reader who favors precise prose of the style that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, aided by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the enjoyment audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the second segment. The protagonist is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid Paul curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world propelled by the anger and fear that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her online critics would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day passed by the deceased with the murderer and his associates. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what occurred as Brandon came to see 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 in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued 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 delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
