I'm going out on a limb perhaps, but I think what makes people be able to relate or not is more up to the person reading the book and story, than what the book and story actually is. Sometimes me and others read the same book, both feel like we can relate to it, even if it's very old and in reality far from our reality, and we both relate to it in different ways. I'd be willing to bet that 100 years from now, people will read contemporary stories set in today and some will see nothing, others will recognize themselves somehow.