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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with characters pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from addictions or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", making it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the text. At the same time, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, because this appears a novel form of writing – documentarian, authentically narrative. Yet it turns out to be laden with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic

Chris Kraus started out as 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, elevating personal female narrative from abjection into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels missed the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted 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 large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that current political era renders personal narrative unnecessary.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning multiple eras – none able to break free from their pasts. There is the tale of Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, moving from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.

As a reader attracted to polished prose of the sort the author herself often avoids, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the initial segment.

Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the bucket that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books comes back in the second segment. Catt Greene is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a environment fueled by the anger and fear that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "property owner" on a reference site. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. At one point she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".

The Killing Story

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy 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 shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.

Fascination and Incompletion

Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par