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The new book centers on characters pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into aggression. Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into willfully cynical through recurring use. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. And yet, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this seems a new kind of book – observational, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as her previous works.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus began as an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She continued writing, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It makes sense that she now wants to explore different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a time when she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature redundant.

Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, transitioning from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the type the author herself tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the initial segment.

As a reader who appreciates precise prose of the style that Kraus often disregards, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like hard candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could persist to the end. The author states here that she resents the satisfaction readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's dedicated 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 middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a environment propelled by the hostility and dread that underpins Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, wandering about fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partly through Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par