Tina Balser is a bored New York housewife-mother married to Jonathan, a pompous, social-climbing lawyer who ridicules her in front of their children, criticizing everything she does or wears. She begins an affair with George Prager, a dashing, successful, and blatantly sadistic writer.

Brooks Wilson is in crisis. He is torn between his wife Selma and two daughters and his mistress Grace, and also between his career as a successful illustrator and his feeling that he might still produce something worthwhile.