I call The Grapes of Wrath a "novel from the time of the Depression," and Uncle Tom's Cabin a "novel from before the Civil War." But I don't have a good word that encompasses both of them. Not like a story could be be set 100 years ago or 1000 and still be called a "historical novel."

Ah, well, we could always borrow a phrase from one bookseeker: "These books are set in a time when things were bad for black people in America".