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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals pursuing clean slates, trying to break free from substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into intentionally weary through its repetitions. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. And yet, Kraus herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, because this presents as a new kind of book – fact-based, truly literary. But then it reveals itself to be laden with the recurring issues and approaches as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form infused into the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she presently aims to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a period in which she asserts that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing redundant.

Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering several time periods – all unable to escape their histories. The book includes the narrative about characters 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 protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.

For this reader attracted to polished prose of the type Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the first section.

As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the first section. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for trivial aspects, like the pail that the young Catt frees from the ice at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I expected this different style could last out the book. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the pleasure readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works returns in the central part. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help her husband curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a society driven by the rage and anxiety that underpins Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on a platform, her occupation changed from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even see".

The Killing Story

Then we reach to the murder itself – and the eponymous day spent by the deceased with the perpetrator and his companions. The author possesses excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man 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 her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who comes alive partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par