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The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals pursuing clean slates, trying to break free from addictions or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into violence. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", rendering it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the text. And yet, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this appears a new kind of book – fact-based, authentically narrative. Yet it turns out to be packed with the recurring issues and aesthetics as her previous works.

From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting confessional female writing from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels lacked the power and directness that the correspondence format infused into the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a maverick maker who had turned into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with new kinds of material, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a period in which she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature obsolete.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the story of Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Additionally the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a community mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.

For this reader attracted to refined literature of the type Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.

Being a reader who appreciates precise prose of the style that the author often disregards, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this different style could last out the book. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works comes back in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society driven by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she states that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her social media opponents would not understand, would overlook entirely".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the titular day passed by the deceased with the perpetrator and his associates. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par