Émile Zola
1) Germinal
Dans la plaine rase, sous la nuit sans étoiles, d'une obscurité et d'une épaisseur d'encre, un homme suivait seul la grande route de Marchiennes à Montsou dix kilomètres de pavé coupant tout droit, à travers les champs de betteraves. Devant lui, il ne voyait même pas le sol noir, et il n'avait la sensation de l'immense horizon plat que par les souffles du vent de mars, des rafales larges comme sur une mer, glacées d'avoir balayé des lieues
...4) Yo acuso
7) J'accuse !
The story of a girl trapped in an unhappy marriage to her first cousin so captivated the French writer Emile Zola that he explored it in multiple works, producing both a novel and a play based on the same core set of characters. The protagonist, Camille, becomes desperate and takes matters into her own hands, committing what may be the perfect crime in order to build a new life for herself. Will she get away with it, or will her paralyzing guilt
...The novel is partly an origin story, with a huge cast of characters swarming around - many of whom become the central figures of later novels in the series - and partly an account of the December 1851 coup d'état that created the French Second Empire under Napoleon III as experienced in a large provincial town in southern France.