🔗 Share this article

The Four Spent the Day Together features protagonists seeking fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the text. And yet, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this presents as a novel form of writing – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. But then it proves to be laden with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.

From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic

The writer began as an creative who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as missives to a distant beloved, elevating personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It follows that she now wants to explore fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to external narratives, at a time when she states that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing redundant.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning multiple eras – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the story of Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the type Kraus often avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

As someone who reads drawn to crafted language of the style that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates small details, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words 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 precisely her dream."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. The author states here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a society driven by the hostility and dread that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "writer" to "property owner" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".

The Homicide Account

Then we reach to the murder itself – and the referenced day experienced by the deceased with the killer and his friends. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what transpired when Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, mooching around fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par