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This latest work is populated with individuals chasing after clean slates, trying to break free from substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the narrative. And yet, Kraus herself is embarking on her individual reinvention, because this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the same dilemmas and styles as her previous works.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

The writer was originally an creative who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating confessional female writing from abjection into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to explore fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that current political era renders personal narrative unnecessary.

Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning several time periods – all unable to escape their pasts. We encounter the story of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, transitioning from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

For this reader fond of honed writing of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

Being a reader drawn to crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that allows space for minutiae, like the bucket that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she shares with her hero Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books comes back in the middle section. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the anger and fear that powers a political win. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her online critics would not understand, would overlook entirely".

The Killing Story

Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the referenced day passed by the murdered individual with the murderer and his companions. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what transpired when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par