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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with characters chasing after new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the story. At the same time, Kraus herself is embarking on her individual reinvention, because this appears a new kind of book – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. However it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as earlier books.

From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic

Kraus was originally an artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the power and directness that the letter form infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she states that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing unnecessary.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning multiple eras – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the narrative about Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the guise of Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.

As a reader fond of refined literature of the kind Kraus herself often avoids, I was captivated by the narrative style of the first section.

Being a reader drawn to crafted language of the variety that Kraus tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. There is a fresh level of observation that makes room for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a environment fueled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her professional designation altered from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the actual killing – and the referenced day spent by the murdered individual with the killer and his friends. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, wandering about getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive partially because of 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 fails to enact these dialogues. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par