West Virginia in the boom days of the coal industry is the locale for [A Vein of Riches, a] rather pedestrian novel which opens in 1909 when coal has made Middleburg a "city of a hundred millionaires," among them the Catherwood family. Clarkson, the husband and father, head of one of the larger companies, is too engrossed in business affairs to pay much attention to his son, Lyle, an only child, or Minnie, his wife, who finds escape in a "born again" religious experience…. A romance of sorts between Lyle and the widow of one of his father's assistants does little to enliven a novel whose characters are basically uninteresting people and whose pace is lethargic.

Agnes C. Ringer, in her review of "A Vein of Riches," in Library Journal (reprinted from Library Journal, February 15, 1978; published by R. R. Bowker Co. (a Xerox company); copyright © 1978 by Xerox Corporation), Vol...