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This latest work centers on protagonists seeking fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", making it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" recur in the text. And yet, she is embarking on her own fresh start, as this presents as a different type of work – observational, authentically narrative. Yet it turns out to be laden with the same dilemmas and styles as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus was originally an creative who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form infused into the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a renegade artist who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a period in which she states that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. There is the narrative about Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.

For this reader attracted to polished prose of the kind Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.

As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that allows space for small details, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, helped by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."

Frustration and Disruption

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this different style could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works returns in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her occupation changed from "writer" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she states that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even see".

The Killing Story

So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day experienced by the deceased with the murderer and his associates. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who gains dimension in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par