Germinal follows the participants of a coal miners strike in northern france and puts a lot of emphasis on the social lives of the townspeople, proletarian or otherwise. it's realistically very bleak and deals with gender politics a lot more than I expected it too. sometimes dragging a bit but the big moments are violent and stick with you, especially since Zola pulled a lot of it from his research trips to mining towns. it's also hilarious that it's like the 13th entry in a long running naturalist middle class soap opera series with reoccurring characters but that kinda adds to it.