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This latest work centers on individuals seeking clean slates, struggling to escape substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, she seems to be making her individual reinvention, since this appears a novel form of writing – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. But then it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and approaches as earlier books.

From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic

Chris Kraus started out as an creative who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting confessional female writing from humiliation into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels missed the power and directness that the letter form infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It makes sense that she currently desires to explore new kinds of material, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she states that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature unnecessary.

Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – none able to break free from their histories. There is the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. There is the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a town long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the kind Kraus often avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the first section.

Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this fresh tone could last out the book. The author states here that she dislikes the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the unpolished style she echoes from her idol author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books returns in the middle section. The protagonist is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting Paul curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that powers a political win. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's investigating the murder so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day spent by the deceased with the killer and his friends. Kraus has excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par