Woman on the Edge of Time, written by Marge Piercy, is a work of feminist fiction published in 1976. The novel is set in 1970s New York and tells the story of thirty-seven-year-old Latino woman named Consuelo, or "Connie," who fights against authority and injustice.

Connie has come from a poor background and has had a troubled life. The novel begins when she is having an argument with her niece Dolly. Dolly is a prostitute, a drug addict, and she is pregnant. Dolly is trying to escape from her pimp Geraldo, but he tracks her down and beats up both her and Connie, leaving them both unconscious. When Connie wakes up, she is in a mental institution. Geraldo has taken her there saying that she attacked him. The staff bought this story, as Connie had been in the institution before. Dolly also backed up Geraldo's story.

Whilst in the institution, Connie starts to have visions of a woman named Luciente. Luciente is from the future, and Connie had spoken to her before. Luciente takes Connie to her commune-like home in the future to show her what a good place it is. It is a place without poverty, without inequality, and a place where everybody is loved. In order to achieve true equality, women no longer bear children. This is now done by a machine in a building known as the "Brooder." There is also no family unit, as everybody lives together as one community.

However, Luciente's community is being attacked by a group of scientists known as the Shapers. The Shapers' experiments led to Luciente's community living as they do, but the Shapers want to conduct further experiments on the group in order to "improve" on society even further.

Connie travels back and forth, from present to future and future to present. Dr. Redding wants to experiment on Connie, as she is seen as having a violent personality. He implants a chip in her brain which electronically controls her emotions. But, as Connie soon discovers, it also takes away what makes a person unique.

On one of her visits to Luciente's community, Connie becomes involved in an armed fight with the combatants for the Shapers. She is horrified to see that they have the faces of the doctors from the institution. She realizes that the Shapers in the present must be killed to prevent the Shapers in the future. She then gets some poison and puts it in the coffee of the doctors. Although she manages to halt the plans for surgery on her brain, she is committed to the institution indefinitely.