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The new book features individuals pursuing clean slates, struggling to escape drugs or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. The author often employs the phrase "fresh start", rendering it willfully cynical through recurring use. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, she seems to be making her own fresh start, as this seems a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. But then it proves to be laden with the recurring issues and styles as earlier books.

From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work

The writer started out as an creative who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a renegade artist who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It is logical that she currently desires to explore fresh narrative sources, turning outward to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that current political era renders personal narrative redundant.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing multiple eras – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader drawn to refined literature of the type Kraus typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the first section.

As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that the author often disregards, I was won over by the literary tone of the initial part. There is a new quality of attentiveness that allows space for minutiae, like the container that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the opening of the book, helped by her beloved father. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this fresh tone could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she has in common with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels reasserts itself in the middle section. The protagonist is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between two different states, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that underpins an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on a reference site. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".

The Killing Story

Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the referenced day experienced by the deceased with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus utilizes great source material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, loitering having his vehicle repaired and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par