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The new book is populated with protagonists chasing after new beginnings, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into violence. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", making it intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the narrative. And yet, the author herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, since this appears a new kind of book – observational, truly literary. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and styles as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

The writer began as an visual artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, converting personal female narrative from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she currently desires to explore different types of content, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing redundant.

Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning multiple eras – each trapped by their pasts. There is the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the persona of Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a town mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.

From my perspective as a reader fond of refined literature of the type the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.

As a reader drawn to crafted language of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. There is a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the bucket that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, helped by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the second segment. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins an electoral success. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. In a moment she states that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even see".

The Homicide Account

So then we come to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the killer and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par