The lady of Sing Sing : an American countess, an Italian immigrant, and their epic battle for justice in New York's Gilded Age
(Book)

"Originally published in Italy in 1993 by Longanesi & Co. as Il Fuoco dell'Anima"--Verso.

Also published in English in 1996 by Four Walls Eight Windows as: The trials of Maria Barbella : the true story of a 19th century crime of passion.

Includes bibliographical references.

"In 1895, an Italian seamstress in New York was accused of killing the man who had raped her, promised to marry her, and was about to abandon her. Following a sensational trial conducted in a language she could not understand, Maria Barbella, at the age of twenty-two, became the first woman sentenced to die in the newly invented electric chair. Idanna Pucci tells this story with immediacy, passion and authority that no other author could have mustered, since Pucci is the great-granddaughter of Cora Slocomb, the American-born Italian aristocrat whose ingenious advocacy saved Maria's life. The result is not only a crime story with all the fury and pathos of classic opera, but a perceptive study of an earlier generation's attitudes toward immigrants, capital punishment, and a woman's right to reject the role of victim"--,Provided by publisher.