As the novel’s protagonist, Linda Radlett is the vessel for the book’s central inquiry into the nature of love. She is a romantic idealist whose entire life is defined by her titular quest for an all-consuming passion. Raised in the eccentric and emotionally intense environment of Alconleigh, Linda develops a worldview that is utterly unequipped for the compromises of ordinary life. Her motivations are purely emotional; she seeks a transcendent connection that she first imagines in fairy tales and later pursues through a series of relationships. This relentless search is the primary engine of the plot, framing her journey as a noble, if naive, effort to live a life of deep feeling, rather than one of conventional security. Her deep capacity for affection is first demonstrated through her intense, tearful devotion to her various pets, a recurring motif that highlights her romantic and humanitarian sensibilities.

Linda’s character is defined by emotional extremes and a fierce, if often misguided, authenticity. Her cousin, Fanny, observes that the Radletts are always “either on a peak of happiness or drowning in black waters of despair” (13), and Linda is the purest distillation of this trait. She cannot feign contentment in her marriage to the stuffy banker Tony Kroesig, nor can she find personal fulfillment in the abstract political ideals of her second husband, the communist Christian Talbot.