One of Gover's key novels, Poorboy at the Party, runs against the publicly sold and traded American Dream, where a party among privileged kids breaks down into a orgy of sex and destruction. Randy, a social-climbing college kid attends a party populated by a combination of old and new money kids who should be Randy's peers by any definition other than wealth. Even though they share the same educational background, poor boy Randy becomes an immediate outcast in this tight-set, narrow-minded heirs to American power.