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The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing clean slates, trying to break free from drugs or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author often employs the phrase "clean slate", making it deliberately jaded through recurring use. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the text. Meanwhile, she is embarking on her individual reinvention, as this presents as a new kind of book – observational, genuinely novelistic. However it turns out to be filled with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

Kraus began as an visual artist who entered the literary world unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into assassination. She kept producing books, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It follows that she now wants to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing unnecessary.

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 narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the persona of Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a locality largely deserted by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

For this reader attracted to honed writing of the sort Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the initial segment.

Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the variety that Kraus usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the youthful Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's story with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the pleasure readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the central part. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. At one point she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the titular day spent by the deceased with the murderer and his associates. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par