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This latest work features characters chasing after fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. And yet, the author herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, because this presents as a different type of work – fact-based, authentically narrative. But then it proves to be filled with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic

Chris Kraus was originally an creative who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating intimate women's literature from abjection into assassination. She continued writing, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It makes sense that she presently aims to explore new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a time when she asserts that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing redundant.

Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning multiple eras – all unable to escape their backgrounds. The book includes the narrative about Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, moving from the urban environment to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a community mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader attracted to polished prose of the kind Kraus herself often avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section.

As a reader who appreciates honed writing of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works returns in the second segment. The protagonist is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a society driven by the hostility and dread that underpins an electoral success. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks 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 online critics would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Fascination and Incompletion

The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par