The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals chasing after fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into violence. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, she is embarking on her personal new beginning, since this seems a novel form of writing – observational, authentically narrative. However it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
The writer started out as an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from abjection into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It makes sense that she currently desires to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to other people's stories, at a moment when she claims that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.
Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. We encounter the story of Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a town largely deserted by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader attracted to honed writing of the sort the author herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the literary tone of the first section.
As someone who reads who appreciates precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the first section. There is a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "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 persist to the end. Kraus says here that she dislikes the enjoyment readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works returns in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a world driven by the rage and anxiety that underpins a political win. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "novelist" 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 researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the deceased with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, loitering fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
