> I don’t know its English title, but roughly translating the Chinese title back, it’s California Gold. It’s about the son of a miner who dreams of striking it rich; step by step he becomes a wealthy man in California. The story has some moral sense, too. It was probably a very popular novel in the U.S. at one point.

Is it this? https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/71775.California_Gold

Based on the author's name being more prominent than the book's title, from what I picked up while working at a library I don't think there was anything special about this book. He probably wrote a lot and had a reliable set of readers who looked for his name, akin to Nora Roberts or a few others I can half-remember.

It's also included but not called out at all on his wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Jakes