This latest work is populated with individuals pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the story. At the same time, she appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, since this seems a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the recurring issues and styles as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing redundant.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the narrative about a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, relocating from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
For this reader drawn to honed writing of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the style that Kraus often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. There is a fresh level of observation that accommodates trivial aspects, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, aided by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's story with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I wished this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the pleasure readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works comes back in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between two different states, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that powers a political win. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she says that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the referenced day experienced by the deceased with the murderer and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
