In Jules Wernersbach’s new novel, Work to Do (out in April from University of Iowa Press), the entry-level workers at the Guadalupe Street Co-Op in Austin make $12 an hour. All three protagonists of Work to Do are starving for a sense of community and trying to find it through their work. I wouldn’t say the Austin of Work to Do feels particularly lived-in—these places are more akin to set dressing. The novel unfolds during hurricane season, and it was the climate change angle that first attracted me to the book. Work to Do is an ode to the service jobs that keep a place like Austin running, the bartenders and grocery store workers and booksellers, the underloved proletariat that keeps those businesses going.