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This latest work features individuals chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind addictions or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into violence. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, she is embarking on her individual reinvention, since this presents as a new kind of book – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and aesthetics as earlier books.

From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, converting intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She continued writing, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a maverick maker who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It follows that she currently desires to try out fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that current political era renders personal narrative unnecessary.

Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning three generations – none able to break free from their pasts. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a town long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.

As a reader fond of honed writing of the kind Kraus herself often avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

As someone who reads who favors crafted language of the kind that the author usually avoids, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she shares with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels returns in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between two different states, failing to help her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the anger and fear that drives Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even see".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day spent by the murdered individual with the murderer and his associates. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, loitering fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.

Fascination and Incompletion

Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par