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This latest work centers on characters pursuing clean slates, trying to break free from drugs or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through recurring use. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this seems a different type of work – fact-based, authentically narrative. Yet it turns out to be filled with the same dilemmas and approaches as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

The writer was originally an artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the letter form imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a renegade artist who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a period in which she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative obsolete.

Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing multiple eras – all unable to escape their histories. The book includes the tale of Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the type Kraus herself often avoids, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the initial segment.

Being a reader who favors honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the satisfaction readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels reasserts itself in the central part. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even see".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, wandering about fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.

Fascination and Incompletion

Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par