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The new book features characters chasing after new beginnings, trying to break free from addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the text. And yet, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, since this appears a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. Yet it proves to be laden with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the impact and rawness that the correspondence format brought to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a maverick maker who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It is logical that she presently aims to explore new kinds of material, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a time when she claims that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature redundant.

Several Eras, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – none able to break free from their backgrounds. We encounter the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the guise of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.

From my perspective as a reader fond of honed writing of the type the author herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

As a reader who favors crafted language of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for small details, like the bucket that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."

Frustration and Disruption

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could persist to the end. The author states here that she is annoyed by the pleasure readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her idol author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the middle section. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a world driven by the anger and fear that underpins a political win. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on Twitter, her occupation changed from "writer" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she states that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Killing Story

So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day passed by the victim with the killer and his friends. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par