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This latest work features individuals chasing after clean slates, struggling to escape substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", rendering it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, because this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. But then it reveals itself to be filled with the same dilemmas and styles as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

The writer was originally an visual artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from humiliation into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature unnecessary.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing several time periods – all unable to escape their pasts. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town largely deserted by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.

For this reader fond of refined literature of the type Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

Being a reader who appreciates honed writing of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. There is a novel degree of detail that allows space for minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, assisted by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story 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 wished this different style could last out the book. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the unpolished style she echoes from her hero Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as her spouse cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. In a moment she states that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the United States that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even see".

The Killing Story

So then we come to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par