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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on protagonists pursuing fresh starts, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it proves to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as her previous works.

From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book

Kraus was originally an creative who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into assassination. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the epistolary style brought to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had become a major property owner, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It is logical that she presently aims to explore new kinds of material, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a period in which she states that current political era turns intimate literature unnecessary.

Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning several time periods – each trapped by their backgrounds. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, relocating from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a locality largely deserted by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.

As a reader fond of polished prose of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the initial segment.

As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. There is a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the pail that the young Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could last out the book. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the satisfaction readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a society fueled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she states 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 fail to comprehend, would not even see".

The Killing Story

Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the eponymous day experienced by the murdered individual with the murderer and his companions. The author possesses excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, loitering fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partly through Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par