The Fortune of the Rougons, originally published in 1871, is the first novel in Émile Zola s monumental twenty-volume series Les Rougon-Macquart. The fictional town of Plassans is established as the setting for the novel and described in intimate detail. The title refers not only to the fortune chased by protagonists Pierre and Felicité Rougon, but also to the fortunes of the various disparate family members Zola introduces, whose lives are of central importance to later books in the series. The Fortune of the Rougons tells the story of Silvère and Miette, two idealistic young supporters of the republican resistance to Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte s coup d état in December 1851. Meanwhile, the foundations of the Rougon family and itsillegitimate Macquart branch are being laid in the brutal beginnings of the Imperial regime. In it we learn how the two branches of the family came about, and the origins of the hereditary weaknesses passed down the generations. Murder, treachery, and greed are the keynotes, and just as the Empire was established through violence.