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This latest work is populated with protagonists chasing after clean slates, trying to break free from substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to see hope turn into conflict. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the text. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, because this appears a novel form of writing – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. Yet it reveals itself to be packed with the recurring issues and styles as her previous works.

From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic

Kraus was originally an creative who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming confessional female writing from abjection into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature redundant.

Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing multiple eras – each trapped by their histories. We encounter the narrative about Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a town long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.

For this reader fond of polished prose of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.

As a reader who favors honed writing of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, assisted by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her hero Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels returns in the middle section. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul cycles through poorly supported positions as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the anger and fear that drives a political win. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she states that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would not understand, would not even see".

The Homicide Account

Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day spent by the deceased with the killer and his companions. Kraus has excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what happened when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, loitering fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par