Not sure if I understand exactly what you mean, but I consider 'contemporary fiction' anything that is published in the current time that takes place in current times, which admittedly, is a rather fluid and problematic definition. Less a category than a 'state'. When I read books that were contemporary in their time (like The Circular Staircase) I have to remind myself that it's not realistic to hold them up to current mores, although that doesn't always make the reading any easier. :P

Mostly my "contemporary" shelf is used to tell my daughter which stories are set in a realistic now, versus an historical or futuristic earth. It just occurred to me when I was writing that blurb, that I had never stopped to define "contemporary" in my own mind. If I keep this up forever I may very well find books on the shelf one day that were published 70 years earlier. That's kind of trippy,