Germinal is but one novel (the 13th) in Zola's 21-volume Rougon-Macquart sequence, which details the generational lives of two French families.
Works that support workers' rights, or those with a socialist bent, are also relevant. Examples include I Will Marry When I Want by Ngugi wa Mirii and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Waiting for Lefty by Clifford Odets, and The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck.