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Frustrated at the path her life has taken, Alice decides to take control of her personal life using astrology as her guide in this quirky, steamy, and hilarious romantic comedy.

Alice Bassi is (a little) over thirty, single (not by choice), and she can’t help but feel that she is failing at this whole adulthood thing. She’s stuck in a dead-end job, just found out her ex-boyfriend is engaged to his pregnant girlfriend, and Richard Gere hasn’t shown up with flowers and a limo to save her from it all.

On one particularly disastrous morning – when Alice would much rather have stayed home, curled up with her favorite rom-coms – she meets Davide Nardi. Handsome yet indecipherable, Davide would be the leading man of Alice’s dreams-if only he weren’t the “hatchet man” brought in to help streamline production and personnel at the small television network she works for.

In the midst of all this, Alice runs into Tio – an actor and astrology expert who is convinced he can turn her life around with a little help from the stars. Skeptical but willing, Alice decides to take Tio’s advice and only date men whose Zodiac signs are compatible with hers. Unfortunately, it turns out that astrological affinity doesn’t always guarantee a perfect match, nor prevent a series of terrible dates, disappointments, and awkward surprises. It also doesn’t keep Davide from becoming more attractive every day.

Tanzania, 1964. When Katie Barstow, A-list actress, and her new husband, David Hill, decide to bring their Hollywood friends to the Serengeti for their honeymoon, they envision giraffes gently eating leaves from the tall acacia trees, great swarms of wildebeests crossing the Mara River, and herds of zebras storming the sandy plains. Their glamorous guests—including Katie’s best friend, Carmen Tedesco, and Terrance Dutton, the celebrated Black actor who stars alongside Katie in the highly controversial film Tender Madness—will spend their days taking photos, and their evenings drinking chilled gin and tonics back at camp, as the local Tanzanian guides warm water for their baths. The wealthy Americans expect civilized adventure: fresh ice from the kerosene-powered ice maker, dinners of cooked gazelle meat, and plenty of stories to tell over lunch back on Rodeo Drive.

What Katie and her glittering entourage do not expect is this: a kidnapping gone wrong, their guides bleeding out in the dirt, and a team of Russian mercenaries herding their hostages into Land Rovers, guns to their heads. As the powerful sun gives way to night, the gunmen shove them into abandoned huts and Katie Barstow, Hollywood royalty, prays for a simple thing: to see the sun rise one more time. A blistering story of fame, race, love, and death set in a world on the cusp of great change, The Lioness is a vibrant masterpiece from one of our finest storytellers.