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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals seeking new beginnings, struggling to escape drugs or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" appear throughout the story. At the same time, Kraus herself seems to be making her own fresh start, as this seems a different type of work – fact-based, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as her previous works.

From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work

Kraus was originally an creative who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating intimate women's literature from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels missed the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style infused into the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to other people's stories, at a period in which she states that current political era makes confessional writing obsolete.

Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, encompassing several time periods – each trapped by their pasts. There is the story of Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, transitioning from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a town mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader drawn to polished prose of the type the author herself tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the novelistic voice of the first section.

As a reader drawn to crafted language of the kind that Kraus herself often disregards, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that allows space for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could continue through the novel. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the unpolished style she echoes from her idol Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works reasserts itself in the central part. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between two different states, failing to help her husband control his drinking. She feels helpless as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a environment driven by the rage and anxiety that powers a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears 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 the nation that her online critics would not understand, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

Then we reach to the actual killing – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and reckless transgression tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The compelling persona is Brittney herself, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par