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The Four Spent the Day Together centers on protagonists seeking clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, because this appears a novel form of writing – fact-based, truly literary. But then it reveals itself to be laden with the same dilemmas and styles as her previous works.

From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book

Kraus began as an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming confessional female writing from self-debasement into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the correspondence format infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a maverick maker who had become a major property owner, so there was significant attention on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to try out fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning several time periods – all unable to escape their backgrounds. There is the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a town largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.

For this reader fond of polished prose of the kind the author herself often avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.

As someone who reads who appreciates precise prose of the variety that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that allows space for small details, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."

Frustration and Disruption

I was fated to feel let down when I wished this different style could last out the book. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her idol author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books comes back in the middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul cycles through low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a society driven by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her professional designation altered from "author" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. In a moment she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an America that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even see".

The Murder Narrative

So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day spent by the deceased with the murderer and his associates. Kraus has great source material, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, loitering getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par