The Four Spent the Day Together features characters seeking fresh starts, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "fresh start", rendering it deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. At the same time, the author herself is embarking on her individual reinvention, as this seems a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. However it turns out to be filled with the familiar conflicts and approaches as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Kraus began as an creative who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming personal female narrative from humiliation into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It makes sense that she now wants to explore new kinds of material, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a time when she states that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative obsolete.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning three generations – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a community largely deserted by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the first section.
As a reader who favors honed writing of the variety that the author tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates small details, like the pail that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, assisted by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. The author states here that she resents the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the unpolished style she has in common with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between two different states, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that drives an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she states that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the homicide in question – and the referenced day passed by the murdered individual with the killer and his friends. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what transpired when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who gains dimension partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
