Graduating from Bryn Mawr College in 1901, Lily Paxton is out of funds and at loose ends. With no immediate family, not raised to work, and no husband in sight, she becomes a "visiting girl," going from home to home among her married friends in Philadelphia.
When the visiting circuit pales, Lily disappears, leaving her best friend Caroline a note saying she is off to an adventure out West. Lily keeps to herself that she is three months pregnant and has left with a man she barely knows-a man who is not the baby's father.
Twenty years later, Lily writes to Caroline from Portland, Oregon, where she is dying of leukemia, asking Caroline to come to her in her final days. Caroline leaps at the opportunity to reconcile with her long-lost friend, but soon discovers that Lily has a hidden agenda that threatens to destroy both their families.
The Visiting Girl is inspired by the young life of movie star Katharine Hepburn's mother, an early graduate of Bryn Mawr and leader of the women's suffrage movement.