Rucker, Rudy v. B. The Hollow Earth : The Narrative of Mason Algiers Reynolds of Virginia. 1st ed. New York: W. Morrow, 1990.

This is a science fiction novel about traveling through the South Pole and into the Earth which is hollow.  

The narrator, Mason, is a teenager who accidently murders someone.  He decides to turn for help to one of his idols, Edgar Allan Poe.  Poe offers to help, and this sets him on a journey to the center of the Earth.

This is an unfavorable look at Poe.  He constantly mistreats Mason.  Poe steals, and swindles, and drinks way too much even before his marriage to Virginia.  Virginia is potrayed as a somewhat annoying little girl.  Poe’s bitterness at being a genius and yet a pauper is overwhelming, but not as overwhelming as his blatant racism.  It is hard to find any good qualities in him at all.