THE COMPANY SHE KEEPS follows a young bohemian intellectual, Margaret Sargent, through her experiences and lost loves in a time of coming war.
Experimental in style, each section of the book describes separate episodes in the main character's life from different viewpoints. The novel begins with the young woman en route to New York, and goes on to paint a satirical portrait of the intellectuals of the time, then depicts the failure of a marriage and ends from the couch as she explores her identity through psychoanalysis.

Mary McCarthy, Introduction by Paula McLain