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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals pursuing clean slates, attempting to leave behind addictions or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into violence. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the text. Meanwhile, she seems to be making her individual reinvention, because this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, genuinely novelistic. Yet it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and styles as her previous works.

From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book

The writer began as an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a renegade artist who had evolved into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with different types of content, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that current political era renders personal narrative unnecessary.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. The book includes the story of Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.

For this reader drawn to honed writing of the sort Kraus herself often avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section.

Being a reader drawn to crafted language of the variety that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It possesses a fresh level of observation that makes room for minutiae, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the second segment. Catt Greene is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the anger and fear that underpins Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his friends. Kraus has great source material, and details moment by moment what transpired when Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's partner Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par