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The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals seeking fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into willfully cynical through recurring use. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this appears a different type of work – fact-based, authentically narrative. Yet it proves to be laden with the familiar conflicts and approaches as her previous works.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

The writer was originally an visual artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting confessional female writing from abjection into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she presently aims to experiment with fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a time when she states that current political era turns intimate literature obsolete.

Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. The book includes the narrative about Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. There is the narrative of the author, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a community largely deserted by progressive politics only a short distance from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.

For this reader fond of polished prose of the kind the author herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section.

Being a reader who appreciates honed writing of the variety that Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that allows space for small details, like the pail that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, assisted by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels comes back in the central part. The protagonist is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while moving between two different states, failing to help her husband control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a environment fueled by the rage and anxiety that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she says that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".

The Murder Narrative

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day spent by the victim with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what happened when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who comes alive in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par