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The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals seeking fresh starts, attempting to leave behind addictions or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into intentionally weary through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the story. And yet, she is embarking on her personal new beginning, because this appears a new kind of book – observational, truly literary. However it reveals itself to be packed with the same dilemmas and styles as her previous works.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

The writer was originally an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating confessional female writing from abjection into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had become a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.

As a reader attracted to polished prose of the kind Kraus often avoids, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the opening part.

Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section. It possesses a fresh level of observation that makes room for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates Emma's story with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this new voice could last out the book. The author states here that she resents the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she echoes from her hero author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her past books comes back in the middle section. Catt Greene 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 curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on social media, her occupation changed from "writer" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".

The Homicide Account

So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day spent by the deceased with the killer and his friends. Kraus utilizes great source material, and details moment by moment what occurred as Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, wandering about getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.

Fascination and Incompletion

The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par