Halle Butler and Susan Hope Lanier are making a stop in Baltimore, MD on their east coast tour! Come out to The Crown on Charles Street to see Halle read from her upcoming novel, Jillian and Susan from her electric collection of short stories, The Game We Play. 

In Jillian, Megan, recently out of college and working a meaningless job as a gastroenterologist's secretary, openly hates all of her friends for being happy and successful. She makes herself feel better by obsessively critiquing the behavior of her coworker, Jillian, a rapid cycling, grotesque optimist, whose downfall is precipitated by the purchase of a dog.

In The Game We Play, Lanier crafts ten riveting, emotionally complex stories that examine the decisions we make when our choices are few and courage is costly. A young couple faces disease and commitment with the same sharp fear, a neglected woman battles her worsening condition of a very real invisibility, and a father makes a split-second decision that puts his child's life at risk.