The new book features protagonists chasing after new beginnings, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into violence. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, as this seems a new kind of book – observational, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and styles as earlier books.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels missed the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a renegade artist who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It follows that she presently aims to try out different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. There is the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. There is the narrative of the author, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader drawn to refined literature of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section.
Being a reader drawn to precise prose of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the first section. It possesses a fresh level of observation that allows space for small details, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books comes back in the middle section. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment propelled 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 "property owner" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she says that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her social media opponents would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the referenced day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
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 reckless transgression wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
