This latest work centers on characters chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the text. Meanwhile, the author herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, because this presents as a new kind of book – documentarian, authentically narrative. But then it proves to be packed with the same dilemmas and styles as earlier books.
From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus was originally an creative who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, elevating confessional female writing from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style infused into 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 significant attention on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to explore different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative obsolete.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning several time periods – all unable to escape their backgrounds. We encounter the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, relocating from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a town long abandoned by liberal ideals only a short distance from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.
As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the kind that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates small details, like the bucket that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this new voice could last out the book. Kraus notes here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the unpolished style she has in common with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting her husband control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the rage and anxiety that underpins an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the nation that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the eponymous day experienced by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, loitering having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
