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The new book is populated with individuals chasing after clean slates, trying to break free from drugs or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, Kraus herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, since this seems a novel form of writing – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. Yet it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

The writer began as an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent engaging and challenging novels lacked the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a maverick maker who had become a major property owner, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It makes sense that she presently aims to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative redundant.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering several time periods – each trapped by their histories. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a town long abandoned by liberal ideals only a short distance from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.

As a reader fond of honed writing of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section.

As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the style that the author often disregards, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the container that the young Catt frees from the ice at the start of the story, assisted by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's story with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this different style could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books comes back in the second segment. The protagonist is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a environment driven by the hostility and dread that underpins Trump's victory. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "property owner" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even see".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the actual killing – and the referenced day spent by the murdered individual with the murderer and his companions. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what occurred as a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, loitering having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par