CAL HOFFMAN’S EASY TO SLIP LAUNCHES SECOND LEG OF NATIONAL TOUR—NOW 20 CITIES STRONG.
Following standing-room-only events in Washington D.C., New York City, Los Angeles, and La Jolla
June 5, 2025, Washington, D.C. — After a wildly successful seven-city tour that began with an inspiring launch in the nation’s capital, followed by multiple city stops that became standing-room-only at Politics & Prose, Barnes & Noble NYC on the Upper West Side, and Book Soup in Los Angeles, Cal Hoffman’s acclaimed debut novel, Easy to Slip, now heads south to launch the second leg of its national tour, which includes 13 cities, beginning with Greenville.
The first stop: Greenville, South Carolina, on Monday, June 9 at 7:30 PM, hosted by M. Judson Booksellers. From there, the tour continues through 12 more cities, concluding in Seattle, Washington.
Easy to Slip has struck a chord across generations with its emotional candor, sharp wit, and humble insistence on the dignity of the everyday. At once a confessional, a road trip, and a spiritual excavation, the novel resists easy labels—and in doing so, reminds readers what fiction can still do when it dares to be honest.
Told in vivid episodes, yet rooted in emotional truth, the story follows a young man arriving at college in gritty 1970s New York. His mind is overrun, his family shaken by an uncle’s sudden stardom, yet he confronts life with unflinching courage. Pulitzer Prize–winner Geraldine Brooks calls the book “raw, brave, and gripping… an uncommon exploration of adolescence, psychosis, and recovery.”
For the first time in over half a century, readers are drawing comparisons to I Never Promised You a Rose Garden--the bestselling novel that dared to depict a real-life case of schizophrenia from the inside out. Like Joanne Greenberg before him, Hoffman writes with clarity, courage, and not a trace of pretense. The result is a debut that restores faith in the literary novel’s ability to illuminate the most tangled corners of the human mind.
What the Literary World Is Saying
• Pulitzer Prize winners Geraldine Brooks, Carl Bernstein, David Auburn, and Doug Wright praise the book (click here to read praise quotes from the authors.)
• Independent bookstores are rallying to meet reader demand.
• Readers are responding to its authenticity: a story of falling down and daring to rise again.
• Easy to Slip is published by Rare Bird Books and distributed by Publishers Group West.
BELOVED GREENVILLE’S M. JUDSON BOOKSELLERS HOSTS ACCLAIMED CAL HOFFMAN’S DEBUT NOVEL EASY TO SLIP TO KICKOFF SECOND LEG OF NATIONAL TOUR
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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M. Judson Booksellers
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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AZIO Media at The Gingerbread House
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
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.
