An elderly curmudgeon lets out a room in his large apartment rent-free to a young student - on condition that she does everything in her power to ruin his son's marriage.

Violette Leduc, born a bastard at the beginning of last century, meets Simone de Beauvoir in the years after the war in St-Germain-des-Prés. Then begins an intense relationship between the two women that will last throughout their...