Frannie and Poe exchanged poems to each other on the public pages of a local newspaper. They wrote to people of fictitious names, but they really meant the poems for each other. This was a scandal among the society folks and they soon had to stop writing poetry to each other because everyone knew what was going on.
Meanwhile, Poe's wife would call on Frannie. She knew that Frannie and Poe were having an affair but she wanted to be friends with Frannie. This kind of freaked Frannie out and she stopped her relations with Poe on a number of occasions because she felt bad at what she was doing to Mrs. Poe. Though they never seemed to stay apart long.
As the book progresses, Frannie gets the distinct feeling that Mrs. Poe is trying to kill her, making the friendship between them even odder.
The author has done a great deal of research into Mrs. Osgood as well as Edgar Allan Poe and his wife. She writes a compelling story of Poe's love for both his wife and his mistress. As a kid growing up in school I always heard what a freak Poe was and this book shed a lot of light on his life. I don't consider him such an oddity anymore.
Rating: 10 / 10
ISBN: 9781476702919
Publisher: Gallery Books
Edition: 1st Edition