Chris Kraus’ latest is a continuation of her longtime autofiction project, that blends elements of memoir and true crime in a three part narrative that spans decades. The book begins with Catt, a young girl who moves to Milford Connecticut with her family, growing up in a working class community where she never fit in and faced a lot of hardship in her teen years. The novel transitions to her adulthood, after Catt has become a successful writer after her book “I Love Dick” has been embraced by the literary world and the Instagram set alike. Amidst her literary success she struggles with social media attacks stemming from her history as a landlord, and her marriage to Paul, a much younger social worker struggling to keep his alcoholism at bay, is on the rocks. In the novel’s final section, Catt dives into investigating the bizarre murder of a young man in rural Minnesota, not too far from her and Paul’s cottage.
The Four Spent the Day Together is a bewitching and strange narrative that doesn’t totally fit together, but is a unique narrative with moments of real magic. I particularly enjoyed the first section, which really dives deep into the struggles of Catt’s parents to maintain a home for her and her sister, who clearly displays signs of a learning disability. The family is constantly struggling to make ends meet, and Catt rebels against her parents and their insular Connecticut community, using drugs, partying with older men, and seeking a bigger life outside what she’s been given with literature, art, and culture. She’s in a constant state of seeking adulthood, as Kraus writes, “Every day at lunch she slipped out the kindergarten entrance and over to Bill’s Diner, a quarter mile from school just past the Naugatuck Four Corners. Her lunch money paid for a hamburger and Coke and she sat at the counter, reading the morning paper alongside commercial travelers and truckers. No one there knew who she was. She liked to think that she could pass as an adult. At times like these she could relax, she was no longer lonely.”
But that loneliness doesn’t go away in her adulthood, even as she’s become more established in her career and has experienced marriage and deep friendships, she still feels like an outsider. This section is where the book lost me a bit, as Kraus wastes airtime settling scores with writers or critics who have made jabs at her on social media, calling her “the foremost landlord of American letters” due to her history of owning properties around the LA area. She reprints Tweets verbatim in the book, and refutes their claims with examples. This section has interesting elements as well, the passages in which she explores Paul’s addiction and the demoralizing work in underfunded treatment centers that drives him back into his old habits are truly fascinating portrayals of the many triggers of addictive behaviors. Its devastating to watch Catt discover the depths of Paul’s addiction and grapple with how it affects their lives.
And then the final section of the book stands a bit apart, as Kraus mostly abandons Catt’s narrative as she becomes obsessed with the murder of a young man by three teens in the Iron Range of Minnesota. The teens live a bizarre online existence and the murder was partially influenced by their usage of methamphetamines and other substances. The murder deals with issues of class, poverty, and addiction: all subjects that have haunted the previous sections of the novel, just heightened to the highest degree of violence. Kraus reproduces text conversations from the teens to give the section a real true-crime doc feel for readers. Overall, the final section closes the book on a harrowing but authentic note—closing the book with an unflinching exploration of how this country has failed its youth.