FIVE CITIES. ELEVEN DAYS. A BREAKOUT NOVEL DISCOVERS ITS AUDIENCE
Tuesday, July 1st, Oblong Books hosts Easy to Slip in Rhinebeck
New York, NY – Following standing-room-only appearances in D.C., L.A., and NYC, Cal Hoffman’s debut novel Easy to Slip tours the Hudson Valley. Five events in eleven days: Rhinebeck, Woodstock, Kingston, Saugerties.
As critic John Freeman noted, “The Hudson Valley may be the most literary region in America. Every town has a writers’ group, a poetry series, and an independent bookstore.” New Yorkers come here not only to unwind but to read, reflect, and muse. The Hudson Valley boasts the highest density of independent bookstores per capita in New York State, making it not just a destination for readers but a proving ground for the books they love.
And that’s exactly how Easy to Slip is making its mark—not in curated shelves or hushed corners, but through a literary convergence between readers, writers and a community that honors both. Between weekend drives and riverside picnics, in the quiet minutes before dusk on the porch, Easy to Slip is a book to explore, cherish, savor.
THE HUDSON VALLEY, FIVE EVENTS - JULY 1 – 11
July 1 – Rhinebeck, Oblong Books (with actor Peter Riegert)
July 5 – Woodstock, Woodstock Library (with journalist David Wallis)
July 9 – Kingston, Camp Kingston (with playwright Cate Berg)
July 11 (afternoon) – Saugerties, Jane Street Art Center
(Live figure drawing session featuring a reading by Cal Hoffman)
July 11 (evening) – Saugerties, Inquiring Minds Bookstore
(With writer Martha Frankel, Executive Director of Woodstock Bookfest)
ABOUT THE NOVEL
Easy to Slip follows a gifted 17-year-old confronting emotional unraveling, family pressure, and the seductive pull of fame he resists. What emerges is a life shaped by honesty, humility, and the private work of becoming whole.
Shared in picaresque form, Easy to Slip is told from the inside out—you don’t just read it, you flinch, laugh, cry, and remember. Cal Hoffman has done something increasingly uncommon: made the act of remembering an act of survival. His path, guided by emotional honesty, intellectual rigor, and creative independence, delivers not just catharsis, but confrontation, clarity, recovery, and grace.
EASY TO SLIP HEADS TO THE HUDSON VALLEY WITH A KICKOFF EVENT IN RHINEBECK, JULY 1
Guests enjoy meeting Cal Hoffman, the author of Easy to Slip with his wife, Victoria Leacock Hoffman at Barnes & Noble UWS, NYC.
Cal Hoffman with his wife, Victoria Leacock Hoffman
Molly Ringwall eager to listen to Cal Hoffman’s Presentation —photo by Patick McMullen.
Over 150 guests packed the space: a mix of literary icons, curious readers, neighborhood regulars, and boldfaced names. The moment Cal read aloud, silence became spellbound.
Easy to Slip Nationwide 2025 Book Tour - Second Leg Begins June
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Monday, June 9, 2025 @ 7:30 PM. M. Judson Booksellers hosts in its Books Over Drinks series, author Cal Hoffman for a reading of his novel, Easy to Slip —a raw, gripping coming-of-age story. The author will engage in conversation with Dorothy Dowe. ($40 includes signed book and specialty cocktail, reserve: here.)
Address: 130 S. Main St., Suite 200A Greenville, South Carolina 29601
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Saturday, June 14, 2025 @ 5:30 PM. AZIO Media’s The Gingerbread house hosts author Cal Hoffman for a reading of his novel, Easy to Slip —a raw, gripping coming-of-age story. The author will engage in conversation with David Henderson.
Address: 280 Holden Beach Road SW Shallotte, North Carolina 28470
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Thursday, June 26, 2025 @ 7 PM, Riverstone Books hosts author Cal Hoffman for a reading and of his novel, Easy to Slip —a raw, gripping coming-of-age story. The author will engage in conversation with Mike Garand.
Address: 5841 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15217
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Easy to Slip begins its Hudson Valley chapter on Tuesday, July 1, @ 6 PM with a special event at Oblong Books: a reading by Cal Hoffman, followed by an intimate conversation with Peter Riegert.
Address: 6422 Montgomery Street, Rhinebeck, New York 12572
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Saturday, July 5, from 5:00 to 6:00 PM, The Woodstock Library hostsCal Hoffman’s Easy to Slip —a coming-of-age story told from the inside. The author will read an excerpt and engage in conversation with David Wallis. Books sold by the Golden Notebook. Join us afterwards at SHELTER, 21 Mill Hill Road. Free drink with us at Shelter, with an Easy to Slip book receipt.
Address: 5 Library Lane, Woodstock, NY 12498
What People Are Saying
“Intricate, hallucinatory, funny and harrowing, Cal Hoffman’s absorbing novel takes us deep into the psyche of an exceptional everyman, whose coming-of-age is at once singular and universal.”
— David Auburn, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Proof.
“At once memoir, novel, and reportage, Cal Hoffman brings us his remarkable gift for the most intimate story-telling: probing his own young psyche, through the language and tools of a writer, to unravel and overcome the hellish mysteries of psychosis. It is impossible not to marvel at this harrowing tour of the mind from deep within and the triumphant distance of recovery.”
—Carl Bernstein, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, author of Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom, All the President’s Men, and Loyalties: A Son’s Memoir
“An uncle’s sudden stardom has unforeseen effects on his nephew’s family. As his celebrity soars, an impressionable boy must grapple with new definitions of success and an unbearable pressure to be special. When he arrives at college in the gritty New York of the 1970s, his mind is overrun by malevolent voices and visions. Raw, brave, and gripping, Easy to Slip is an uncommon exploration of adolescence, psychosis, and recovery.”
—Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of March.
With the veracity of a diarist, Cal Hoffman uses vivid stream-of-consciousness prose to dramatize the story of a precocious young Columbian student doing his very damnest to stay on the right side of sanity. It's a story that touches the heart and the mind in equal measure....by Doug Wright, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright of I Am My Own Wife.
With the veracity of a diarist, Cal Hoffman uses vivid stream-of-consciousness prose to dramatize the story of a precocious young Columbian student doing his very damnest to stay on the right side of sanity. It's a story that touches the heart and the mind in equal measure....by Doug Wright, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright of I Am My Own Wife.
“With the veracity of a diarist, Cal Hoffman uses vivid stream-of-consciousness prose to dramatize the story of a precocious young Columbian student doing his very damnest to stay on the right side of sanity. It’s a story that touches the heart and the mind in equal measure.”
Doug Wright, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright of I Am My Own Wife.
About the Author
CAL HOFFMAN
Cal Hoffman is a writer, educator, and actor. He graduated from Catholic University and studied at Webber-Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art in London and the MFA Fiction Writing program at Columbia U. He taught English and creative writing to immigrant children, private school students, and foster youth.
Cal acted in regional theater nationwide and starred in the acclaimed New York revival of Jules Feiffer’s play Elliot Loves.
He lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife, Victoria Leacock Hoffman, and their son, Harry. Cal is currently completing his second novel, Judah Can’t Tell.
