This latest work is populated with characters chasing after fresh starts, trying to break free from substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the narrative. And yet, she seems to be making her own fresh start, because this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, authentically narrative. However it reveals itself to be packed with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus was originally an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels lacked the impact and rawness that the epistolary style imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It makes sense that she currently desires to try out different types of content, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a moment when she states that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their backgrounds. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, transitioning from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a locality mostly forsaken by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
As a reader fond of refined literature of the type Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads who appreciates honed writing of the kind that the author tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. There is a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". She tells the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I wished this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she resents the pleasure readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the middle section. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between two different states, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that powers a political win. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. In a moment she states that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the nation that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the murder itself – and the referenced day passed by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has great source material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, loitering fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who comes alive in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
