Considered the first "Beat" novel, Go depicted events in his life with his friends Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg.

Holmes also wrote what is considered the definitive jazz novel of the Beat Generation, The Horn.

The term later became part of common parlance when Holmes published an article in The New York Times Magazine entitled "This Is the Beat Generation" on November 16, 1952 (pg.10).

In the article, Holmes attributes the term to Kerouac, who had acquired the idea from Herbert Huncke.

Holmes came to the conclusion that the values and ambitions of the Beat Generation were symbolic of something bigger, which was the inspiration for Go.