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The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals pursuing new beginnings, attempting to leave behind drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the text. Meanwhile, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, since this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. Yet it turns out to be filled with the familiar conflicts and styles as earlier books.

From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work

Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It is logical that she currently desires to try out fresh narrative sources, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she states that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature redundant.

Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering several time periods – all unable to escape their pasts. We encounter the tale of Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader attracted to polished prose of the sort Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the first section.

As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that the author often disregards, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the young Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a environment driven by the hostility and dread that underpins an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what transpired when Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par