This latest work centers on individuals seeking fresh starts, trying to break free from addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself is embarking on her individual reinvention, as this appears a new kind of book – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it proves to be filled with the recurring issues and styles as past novels.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels missed the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a maverick maker who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It makes sense that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a time when she states that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing obsolete.
Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing three generations – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, transitioning from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a locality mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads who appreciates crafted language of the kind that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section. It possesses a novel degree of detail that allows space for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the opening of the book, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment fueled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. At one point she remarks 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 social media opponents would not understand, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day spent by the deceased with the killer and his associates. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when 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 affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
