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The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with characters seeking new beginnings, attempting to leave behind drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the text. And yet, Kraus herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, as this seems a different type of work – observational, truly literary. However it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and approaches as past novels.

From Unplanned Author to Renowned Book

Kraus began as an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as missives to a distant beloved, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature unnecessary.

Three Generations, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering multiple eras – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the story of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

As a reader drawn to honed writing of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the opening part.

As someone who reads who appreciates crafted language of the style that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates small details, like the container that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."

Disappointment and Disjunction

I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this fresh tone could last out the book. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels returns in the central part. Catt is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she states that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even see".

The Killing Story

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the murderer and his companions. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what happened when Brandon came to see Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt develops an obsession by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par