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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals pursuing clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, Kraus herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, since this presents as a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. Yet it proves to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as earlier books.

From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic

The writer was originally an creative who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming intimate women's literature from abjection into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the power and directness that the letter form infused into the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a maverick maker who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It makes sense that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to external narratives, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.

Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, relocating from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one troubled youth 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 fond of honed writing of the type the author herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the opening part.

As a reader drawn to precise prose of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was won over by the literary tone of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for small details, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, helped by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this fresh tone could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books returns in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a society driven by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the titular day experienced by the murdered individual with the murderer and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, wandering about getting his car mended 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 aggressive outbursts.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par