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This latest work centers on individuals pursuing fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into violence. Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, she appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, since this appears a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. But then it turns out to be filled with the recurring issues and styles as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

Chris Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the impact and rawness that the epistolary style infused into the tone of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a maverick maker who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It follows that she now wants to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to other people's stories, 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, covering several time periods – each trapped by their histories. The book includes the narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, transitioning from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a locality largely deserted by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader attracted to refined literature of the sort the author herself often avoids, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.

As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the kind that Kraus often disregards, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial part. There is a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a lovely toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."

Frustration and Disruption

I was fated to feel let down when I expected this new voice could persist to the end. The author states here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the anger and fear that underpins Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her occupation changed from "writer" to "landlord" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even see".

The Homicide Account

Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the victim with the killer and his associates. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what transpired when Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. 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 repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Fascination and Incompletion

Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par