The Four Spent the Day Together from Chris Kraus – A Cult Writer Explores Fresh Territory

The new book features characters seeking fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the text. At the same time, Kraus herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, since this presents as a novel form of writing – fact-based, truly literary. However it turns out to be filled with the familiar conflicts and approaches as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

Kraus was originally an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a time when she states that current political era renders personal narrative unnecessary.

Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the story of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a locality long abandoned by liberal ideals only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.

For this reader drawn to polished prose of the kind the author herself often avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial segment.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for small details, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her hero Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between two different states, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a environment propelled by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the killer and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who gains dimension in part due to Catt seeing herself in 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 jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par