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Linda Radlett, raised in isolation at Alconleigh by the furious, hunting-mad Uncle Matthew, marries the dull Tory banker's son Tony Kroesig. She then leaves him for the earnest Communist Christian Talbot and follows him to the Spanish refugee camps, before finding real love with the French duke Fabrice de Sauveterre after being stranded penniless at the Gare du Nord.
Linda falls for Tony and for Christian because each offers an escape from what she already has: Tony from Alconleigh, and Christian's political fervour from the Kroesigs' philistine banking world. Each time she projects the grand passion she longs for onto whoever is newest. The novel suggests that someone hungry for love will repeatedly mistake a change of scene for a change of heart, until an encounter matches the fantasy on its own terms.
Uncle Matthew terrorises the household with rages and hunts his own children with bloodhounds. He also declares that 'abroad is unutterably bloody and foreigners are fiends.' Fanny's narration treats these excesses as lovable absurdity rather than abuse, showing how a family's shared humour domesticates a patriarch's violence and prejudice. Seen this way, the comic frame both protects the children and blinds them to real neglect, such as their lack of formal education.
Fanny, whose mother is the absent 'Bolter', chooses a steady marriage to a don. She tells Linda's story from the outside, so Linda's reckless pursuit is measured against Fanny's prudent life. This dual structure lets the novel both celebrate and question grand passion. The ending leaves open whether Linda's brief happiness outweighs a lifetime of Fanny-like safety.