Book Review – Clint Clusterfuk by Lucas Pederson

Clint Clusterfuk. If step one on the road to writing a book is an eye-catching title, well, Clint Clusterfuk. Though I should warn you, it is pronounced Clooster Fook.

The name is Norwegian after all. Or is it. Well it is Clint himself who tells us that within the book but I wouldn’t take everything Clint says as gospel.

Clint Clusterfuk, the book, is brought to us from the mind of the talented, Lucas Pederson. Pederson lives in a small town in Iowa, in the United States. Pederson is also the author of books such as Leviathan – Ghost Rig, Flux, The Guillotiner and Dark Waters to name just a few. Clint Clusterfuk was released on the 19th September 2019 via Severed Press. Severed Press are the independent publisher that sit behind a whole host of the science fiction/horror industries brightest including one of our favourites, Dave Jeffery.

He was eleven when the alien bug broke into his home, slaughtered his family, and left him with superior strength and weird healing powers. The years since, he’s been the REAL super, intergalactic badass. Like, the baddest. No one could ever compare. Maybe. He leads teams and platoons into battles, ending planetary wars before they can even begin. He singlehandedly saves Earth Two from two invasions and stops an intergalactic war. So what if too many people die and planets are destroyed. At least the threats are gone, right?

Clint Clusterfuk is one hell of a journey into the mind of a man you might describe as a bit nuts. I am talking about the character, Clint Clusterfuk, of course, but considering he has been conjured up from the mind of Mr Pederson, well, perhaps we should be a little concerned for his current mental state too? Clint Clusterfuk is an American badass. Not like the Kid Rock style. More like Duke Nukem or Deadpool or other such anti heroes. Clint is a solider. A specialist. An asskicker. Send him into battle and expect positive results but Clint doesn’t work well with others.

The story is set in the future, in a science fiction landscape. We have alien races, multiple planets including an Earth 2, futuristic weapons and armour and super soldiers. Clint is a soldier type called an Elite Sergeant. He is the best. He sports a futuristic armour suit that gives him advanced shields, weapons and abilities which just adds to his own talents unfortunately gained when alien DNA mixed with his while his parents were slaughtered.

Clint reflects on this regularly throughout the tale suggesting it has impacted him much more than his hard exterior would ever admit to. If anything it may be the cause for his almost suicidal actions. His lack of care for himself as he runs head on into battles against aliens, dimension hopping bugs and, em, kangaroos with little consideration for his safety or for the safety of others around him. His super strength and his suit have also given him a level of arrogance that is hard to measure. He genuinely seems to be certain that he will win against any odds, while simultaneously not caring if, by some miracle, he were to get in trouble.

We meet Clint for the first time getting himself into and out of and then back into a bit of bother. Starting with the instant disobeying of a superior’s orders, he throws himself into the midst of a battle, successfully destroying the enemy while also, apparently, taking out a chunk of his own side and ignoring his Captain’s mission critical orders. The outcome of all of this is Clint gets himself demoted and sent back to Earth. Specifically Australia. In Australia he is assigned to a team hunting rabid ‘roos in the outback. A long fall for the once supreme ass kicker and name taker in the whole galaxy.

Time passes and eventually there is a crisis off Earth that requires some serious expertise. There is only one man brave enough, or stupid enough for the job. Clint returns to space, despatched to a station on an extermination mission. It is quite simple. Space station full of alien bugs? Add one Clint Clusterfuk for instantly cleaned surfaces. But is there more to this station than meets the eye? Can Clint’s latest superiors be trusted? What is really waiting for him on the station and, can the baddest badass ever overcome odds that even, slightly, dent his own self confidence? You know what to do if you want to find out!

Clint Clusterfuk gave me two over riding feelings upon completion. One was that it was damn entertaining and two was that it was absolutely bonkers. The way the story reads is almost like a script and Clint has a mouth that doesn’t stop. His mastery of insulting language is up their with the best, often coming out with phrases and insults that would make Deadpool blush. When he isn’t hurling insults at everyone around him, friend or foe, he runs an insane internal dialogue. He argues with himself, contradicts himself, praises himself and tells himself to shut up, regularly.

So reading the story becomes a little like reading a script where 90% of the lines belong to Clint and his venomous, yet cheesy, tongue. To give you some examples, within the first few pages we had already been witness to some crackers. Clint calling his superior Captain Constipation, Captain Skid Mark and Captain Spanky in quick succession. Some nice terms like cockblocks, thumbs up poop chutes, sucking fuzzy donkey balls, tricky douchecanoes and dickwarts.

What is fascinating about Clint Clusterfuk is that on the face of it, it is just a book leaking with expletives and hilarious insults but there is more to it. First of all there is a glorious science fiction setting. Then there is the underlying story of deception, alien armies, different dimensions and the like. Finally, is the slightly masked back story that comes within the lines of filth that circle in Clint’s mind. If you look just below the surface, we learn of betrayal, a desire for revenge, murdered parents and of course a love of Mexican food. What often appears as a shallow and brilliantly vulgar, mindless story also occasionally shows itself as being much more.

I doubt Clint would be too happy with this analysis of his self so enough with the depth. Outside of that Clint Clusterfuk also operates as a hugely entertaining jaunt that has you turning the page just to see what he comes out with next. And if you think he is bad, just wait until he gets to Australia! My god I love the time he spent there. I pretty much got to the point where i had a notebook, taking down phrases and words for use in the future. My little book of Clint’s insults.

Overall I found Clint Clusterfuk to be a remarkably addictive tale packed full of adventure and insanity. It is a breathless story, moving at high speed as we get whipped around a galaxy all while living in the mind of an absolute head case. Like Starship Troopers if Deadpool was the main character, Clint Clusterfuk is brilliant fun.

Do yourself a favour and head on over to Amazon and grab yourself a copy from here. Find out more on Lucas Pederson at his Facebook page, here.