Alcide Darbois, a small-time garage owner, and his sister Ursule come into a fabulous inheritance and become powerful industrialists. The cars they make a re very successful on the French market. Now a bit of a snob, Alcide decides to marry his daughter Suzanne to Marquis Gaëtan de la Michodière, but the young lady is actually in love with Bégonia, her father's chief worker. A car racing event will resolve the situation.

Denise, an orphaned girl, moves to Paris where she hopes to find work at her uncle's store. But the glamorous department store 'Aux Bonheur des Dames' across the street crushes all the little businesses around. She finds a position there.

The suffering and rebellion of 12-year-old François Lepic, nicknamed "Carrot Top" by his mother, who hates him. Occupied with the council elections, his father appears unaware that the young boy is increasingly tempted by suicide.

Julien Villandrit is the owner of the estate of Les Basses-Bruyères and its textile factory, where the manager is his childhood friend Corradin. Julien marries his neighbour Régine, unaware that Corradin also loves her. Julien is sent to gaol for a murder actually committed by Corradin. The only witness to the truth is the woodsman Rudeberg and Corradin buys his silence by paying for the education of his son Pascal. Julien's struggle to clear his name and to rescue Régine and their daughter Christiane from Corradin's scheming extends over many years and faces many setbacks.

A doctor researched the duplication of personality , and found in the person of René de Varennes, who had attempted suicide, a subject of study.

When the commander of a cruiser ,which sank in a confrontation,is tried for negligence, will the wife speak up in his defense? Unknown to him, she was trapped in the cabin below with her former lover, a subordinate officer.

Luc Froment, a reform-minded engineer, starts working at a steel mill in a small town. There he founds small groups of workers (and their families) under miserable conditions. Under the influence of Fourier's ideas, Froment tries to turn the mill into a workers' co-operative.