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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals seeking clean slates, trying to break free from addictions or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into conflict. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into willfully cynical through recurring use. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and styles as earlier books.

From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book

The writer started out as an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It follows that she presently aims to try out different types of content, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she claims that current political era renders personal narrative redundant.

Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the story of Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, moving from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.

As a reader who appreciates precise prose of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It possesses a novel degree of detail that allows space for small details, like the pail that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her hero Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her occupation changed from "writer" to "landlord" on a reference site. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".

The Killing Story

So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day passed by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to go further into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par