Dans Une femme au bord du temps, Consuelo Ramos, faussement accusée d'avoir abusé de sa fille et internée dans un établissement psychiatrique, rentre en contact avec (ou hallucine l'existence) d'un émissaire d'une future utopie appelée Mattapoisett, qui a surgi au lendemain d'une « révolution féministe complète », une vision d'une Amérique dans laquelle les femmes et les hommes sont véritablement égaux et entiers. Ce livre de 1976, inédit en français, est considéré comme un classique de la littérature féministe et dystopique américaine, à la hauteur de La main gauche de la nuit d'Ursula K. Le Guin et La servante écarlate de Margaret Atwood, œuvres auxquelles il est régulièrement comparé.

Her marriage over, her life unraveling, writer Leila Landsman turns to work and finds herself drawn to the sensational story of Becky Burgess, a young woman accused of killing her husband with the help of her teenage lover. Becky thought she'd escaped the grim poverty of her childhood when she married up, but her husband was soon planning to trade her in for a newer model. And that's just what happened to Mary Burke, whose middle-class life ended with her divorce. Now Leila's housecleaner, Mary has a secret: she is homeless. They are three very different women who share the same longings: to be seen for who they are, to be valued and loved, but most of all, to have a physical and emotional home that can't be taken away....

After being unjustly committed to a mental institution, Connie Ramos is contacted by an envoy from the year 2137, who shows her a utopian future of sexual and racial equality and environmental harmony. But Connie also bears witness to another potential outcome: a dystopian society of grotesque exploitation. One will become our world. And Connie herself may strike the decisive blow...