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The new book is populated with individuals chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, as this presents as a different type of work – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and approaches as earlier books.

From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book

The writer was originally an artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating personal female narrative from humiliation into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It follows that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics renders personal narrative redundant.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing multiple eras – none able to break free from their histories. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a town largely deserted by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.

As a reader fond of polished prose of the kind Kraus typically rejects, I was captivated by the narrative style of the initial segment.

As a reader drawn to precise prose of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the literary tone of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that allows space for small details, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the pleasure those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she echoes from her idol Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the central part. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between two different states, failing to help her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a environment driven by the anger and fear that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the killer and his friends. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.

Fascination and Incompletion

Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par