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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals seeking new beginnings, trying to break free from addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the story. And yet, Kraus herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, since this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.

From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book

Chris Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels missed the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It follows that she currently desires to try out new kinds of material, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.

Several Eras, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning multiple eras – each trapped by their backgrounds. We encounter the tale of Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section.

As someone who reads who appreciates crafted language of the kind that Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for minutiae, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."

Frustration and Disruption

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could persist to the end. The author states here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the second segment. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the hostility and dread that drives Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. At one point 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 nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".

The Killing Story

Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the eponymous day passed by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what happened when Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a struggling, neglected community. 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 degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par