The new book is populated with characters chasing after clean slates, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", making it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the text. Meanwhile, she is embarking on her own fresh start, because this appears a new kind of book – observational, authentically narrative. Yet it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
The writer started out as an artist who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative redundant.
Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing multiple eras – none able to break free from their histories. There is the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to honed writing of the type Kraus herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the style that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the pail that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this new voice could continue through the novel. The author states here that she resents the pleasure readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works returns in the central part. The protagonist is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society fueled by the anger and fear that drives an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "property owner" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the killer and his friends. The author possesses excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
