Wrath of the Wendigo

by Clay Martin

Thinly veiled fiction, Wrath of the Wendigo is the story of America 2.0, how a crumbling Empire gave birth to a new Republic.

Wendigo General Eric Hansen has undertaken a mission to personally deliver a message to the rulers of the old world. Still powerful, still dangerous, and still locked onto the throat of the fledgling Republic. Breaking into an unassailable temple and walking into captivity, Hanson tells the tale of Cascadia’s rise as he is moved steadily towards his ultimate destiny.

A deft mixture of spiritual awakening, insurgency, and Manifest Destiny, Wrath of the Wendigo is a thrilling mystery that pulls your belief structure inside out with its twists, turns, and remarkable vision.

Genres: Fiction, Military Fiction

215 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 19, 2022

Reviews

[Sauvage Yawinonh · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the absolute worst drivel I have ever endured. Not only is it your classic white supremacist propaganda (ya know, the kind that is ok with non-white people as long as they assimilate and serve white interests), it’s written horribly. The author couldn’t even bother to try to hide his disdain for poor people, women, & transgender people. As a native who is also Nordic, this book was an absolute ignorant portrayal of both my cultures. This book is the epitome of mediocre white male audacity. For example, it praises Western Europeans for being the “only people” who really believe in individual sovereignty, but then they can’t allow an individual the sovereignty to determine their own gender? This is an actual point especially when the author is appropriating native cultures where more than two genders are the norm in my culture. I only read this because a friend asked me to and let them know what I thought. Well, it’s trash. Even it’s tactics of revolution are drivel- literally murdering a school full of kids. It wasn’t even entertaining- it reads like the author’s masturbatory fantasies of superiority. Hard pass on anything by this author.

[Jack Dawes · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm disgusted by a lot in this book: the "European race" destiny garbage, the "only fools would allow women to vote" misogyny, the murder of refugees and expectation for the reader to see that as a regretful but wise and necessary action.

This is trash.

[Audrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read it in one sitting

This book was awesome, hard guys doing hard things. Hopefully it stays fiction but the powers that be seem to be doing there dampest to make some of these thing happen. Great book

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

ok, so this was a really good way to talk about the current affairs of America and the world. It got a little windy at times but I understand why. I loved the story, I loved reading that I wasn’t the only one that felt like that. Will continue reading the stories and see how Clay plays it out. I would go far enough to call this Recent Historical Fiction.

[Cody · Rating 1 out of 5]

Quite possibly one of the worst books I have ever had the misfortune of reading. If I could give it negative stars I would.

The first thing I have to say about Clay Martin after reading this book is that he is an intellectual and ideological coward. That is the most important thing to know if you plan to read this. The first thing he lays out in this book is that he takes no responsibility for any of it, because he didn't really write it, a "spirit" possessed him and dictated it to him. This is spineless, flaccid cowardice at its purest form, to try at the beginning of your incredibly racist and morally and creatively bankrupt novel to pretend like you had nothing to do with its writing or publishing. I know Mr. Martin is trying to sell himself as some kind of new-gen American warrior-poet spiritualist -- Hansen is his painfully obvious self-insert in this book -- but at least have the spine to stand by your own ideas.

This book is absolute trash. It is offensive and offensively bad. Not only is it blatantly racist towards anyone who isn't a White Western European or a "pure-blooded" descendant of them -- Clay Martin goes so far as to have his self-insert call African-Americans "daemons" multiple times, to call Arabs and Mexicans an "unwashed horde of invaders" -- he also hates women, gay people, transgender people, and people who disagree with any of his ideas on the matter despite him spending the entire book trying to paint himself and his ideals as "freedom" and how he's totally able to handle people not agreeing with him, unlike the "woke Globalists". I get the feeling from this book that Clay Martin is a deeply hateful and fearful man who would claim he's not afraid of the things he's railing against, though the fact that he spends so much mental energy calling them demonic, unnatural, and indeed straight-up evil tells me otherwise. Funnily enough, Martin likes Christianity, but he is the type to ignore things like "love thy neighbor" and the actual words of Christ and instead more or less says in the course of this book that American Christianity is too accepting and tolerant, and that real Christians would start a crusade against the evil invaders (who of course happen to be non-white people and Muslims). Martin also seems to think that White European Men are the only people in the world with any sense or ability to self-determine, and goes so far as to say that Asians are "culturally programmed to fall in line". He plays very deliberately into the disproven myths that the 2020 American election was rigged and that the Jan 6 protest was just "citizens trying to show their discontent in a peaceful way". So much of this book feels like it is hearkening back to the old post-WW1 German Dolchstoßlegende, wherein the only competent and smart and capable people are military personnel who fought on the front lines because they weren't "corrupted" by the civilian government or lifestyle during the war and that the Imperial German Army lost the war because they were betrayed by the soft, weak, incompetent civilians at home, by the bankers and Jews. Interesting note is that this myth was a cornerstone of Nazi ideology, which Martin seems to be a big fan of given how this book is written.

The thing is though, even if you can somehow ignore all of that -- which will be very difficult, because a solid 75% of this book is Clay Martin's self-insert Hansen explaining his entire worldview to the audience in the most direct, boring, uninteresting way possible --the problem remains that this isn't a very good piece of writing, either. Martin cannot write interesting characters for the life of him. The characters I remember most in the entire book are Hansen, because that is Martin's self-insert and most of the book is him not shutting up about how White Straight European Men are the most oppressed people in the world, and Jason Marsh, mostly because Marsh stands in as the audience asking Hansen to continue his stupid political ranting. All of the characters who I am supposed to disagree with in this novel are some combination of stupid, non-white, unable to control their emotions, ignorant, or gay/transgender. All of the characters Martin wants me to agree with and think are based and cool are strong silent "sheepdog" soldier-man types, most of whom are or were military men (because Martin was in the military), and all talk as if they are smart, elevated, educated academics, except for when Martin can't resist throwing in a random "joke" that isn't funny for no reason. They're all super badasses and capable of beating anyone up in a fight even at a major disadvantage and it almost feels like blatant fetishism of the hypermasculine "sheepdog" aesthetic. Whenever they make threats smart people are scared of them and stupid people keep trying to fight until they are almost or straight-up killed in a fight.

Martin's setting-writing and worldbuilding is terrible, which is ironic considering most of this book is him trying to justify this American breakaway state coming into existence. Many of the things that he says happened to make this breakaway state come into existence are so implausible or require such incompetence on the part of everyone involved (except, of course, for the hyper-competent super badass soldier sheepdog men) that it is impossible to believe. The ideas about "forcing compliance" by bussing in immigrants is so stupid it makes my head spin. It often feels like Martin played Metal Gear Solid 2 and missed the entire point of the colonel's speech at the end of the game, because he tries to make many of the same points but misses the mark entirely and says "well all the bad stuff happening is because of the communist globalists and brown people working to destroy the white race". He divides the world into good and evil and pretty much unequivocally says that only "his" people are Good and everyone else has always been evil or has been corrupted to be evil by the Communists/Globalists. I would genuinely challenge Mr. Martin to define what a Communist is because I don't think he actually knows what that word means.

Clay's dialogue is also excessively boring to read, and when it isn't it's either annoying or painful. Take for example just a few lines from the first third of the book, and keep in mind these are all serious lines Clay wrote without trying to be funny and that these are things he really believes. All of these quotes except the last (which is from colonel Thompson) will be from Hansen as he talks the most and I really want to illustrate how smug and sneering and pretentious/pseudo-intellectual his dialogue all sounds.

"Christianity had been largely cucked as an institution."

"The ideas of individual sovereignty and self-rule are native only to Western Europeans. Sure, they exported that to some degree in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. But it is only found on a deep cultural level among those people."

"Second, it is five degrees cooler in here than is comfortable, notably even from the hallway that brought us in. That is a pretty specific air conditioning setup, one I’m sure you don’t use for all your guests. Compounded with being in a metal chair, it is supposed to have the effect of inducing physical discomfort to match the mental discomfort."

“He was seventeen years old when that happened. Appointment to the Air Force Academy lined up, senior year of high school, he was a made man. His father was one of the pilots that refused to fly a sortie, out of Travis Air Force Base. The air force, in its infinite wisdom, court martialed him. To make an example. General Basset lost his academy slot, but that was just a start. The services can have long memories when they want to. He came up the hard way, but despite stellar scores, wasn’t allowed into the flight program. It’s a statement to his tenacity and ability he made it to brigadier general anyway, but he will go no further. So you might say he holds a bit of a grudge about that.”

Clay just can't help but masturbate in the audience's face about how smart and knowledgeable he thinks he is, because so many times during this book he has his self-insert (or someone else are supposed to think is smart) explain things or have knowledge on things like military tactics, interrogation tactics, religion, history, philosophy, etc. and it's usually the most basic of knowledge that one could find, but Martin treats it like hidden lore that he spent a lifetime unearthing. The problem with this is that every other character also treats it like a major shock either that Hansen knows these things or are flabbergasted and awed at how smart and knowledgeable he is. For example, the last quote from Hansen above is at the beginning of the novel where Hansen is in an interrogation room and he starts smugly listing out all the techniques that the police have done to make the room and situation physically uncomfortable for him to the police officer who ordered those things done, and the officer reacts like Hansen has just told him something he could never possibly know, like top-secret confidential Area 51-level knowledge. The problem is is that I, the reader, knew all of those things happen in police interrogations, and by no means am I deeply interested in the subject, nor am I involved in law enforcement at all, nor do I really research interrogation techniques or tactics. But I knew it already, and even if I didn't, it doesn't really make much sense for the interrogator in the novel to react the way he does. It's just there to try to awe the reader more into thinking Hansen is so smart and cool, because he is Clay Martin's self-insert. There's plenty more dry, pretentious, worthless drivel but I'll spare you the suffering.

Funnily enough, Clay has another self-insert in this book beyond Hansen in Tonn. Tonn is the originator of Hansen's whole movement and basically their Christ figure. Clay martin writes explicitly that Tonn "might not be the messiah" but everything else he writes points to Hansen (and by extension, Martin) thinking of the character like that, all the way down to a downright obnoxious analogue to Tonn having twelve apostles. Tonn is basically another superbadass Warrior-Poet sheepdog without any personality, and he did all kinds of stuff after leaving the military like become a neo-pagan and then make an ancient Native American monster of myth submit to him. Tonn's backstory is essentially Martin masturbating about how cool and based Native Americans and the Nordic peoples were except not in a genuine way that is interested in their culture and history but a very convenient misinterpretation and appropriation that serves his fascistic tendencies and makes him seem more "spiritual" and "in tune with nature". Tonn is white but of course speaks perfect Cree, even better than the Native Americans he encounters, and is of course more in tune with the nature and the spiritual world than them, but he also knows everything about every religion ever because he studied all of them, and he is a super badass who is so good at War and strategy you guys, and he's also so good at fighting and killing people. Through Tonn, Martin is trying to fetishize Indigeneous culture and twist it into his white nationalist wet dream, but ironically he is so ignorant about real Indigenous cultures that his depictions of them (in addition to how his white character is so much better at being native american than actual indigenous people are) come off as offensive racial caricatures you'd see in a political cartoon from 1866.

Tonn also murders a guy who was hitting his kids and wife, not out of altruism for helping the wife and children but to serve his own selfish ego and code of honor. And instead of thinking about what the unintended consequences an action like rogue vigilantism might have on the family or community, like a halfway decent author might do, Clay Martin instead says "Yeah and then everyone knew he did it but they were all so glad he did it and they always smiled at him and the guy he murdered's ex-wife basically let him have sex with her". It's gross, frankly. I'm the last person to defend child abuse but this just reeks of Martin once again writing out his fetishes and desires and pretending it's fiction.

This book really does just have Martin writing random interjections in the middle of entirely different conversations solely so Martin can tell you what his opinion on a random sociopolitical topic is. For example in one conversation while Hansen is talking about the abusive man Tonn killed, Hansen says that Tonn found the man's children "beautiful" and Marsh uncharacteristically makes a weird joke about Tonn being a pedophile. Marsh has not made a single joke in this book before this by the way. Anyway, Hansen gets mad and says that if Marsh ever makes a joke like that again he'll break his handcuffs and rip Marsh's tongue out, because pedophiles where Hansen comes from are the lowest scum of the earth and are tortured to death and the fathers of the kids who were abused are beaten for allowing it to happen. And like, I agree that abuse of children is an icnredibly depraved and evil act as a CSA survivor myself, but what this reads like to me is Clay Martin masturbating in the audience's face and doing some moral showboating to show how moral and righteous he is, especially since this tangent happens in a conversation that has nothing to do with CSA. It also is another example of the badass guys making threats that all the smart people cow to. It's like posturing in the WWE.

There's a lot more to this book that I could go on for hours and hours about, but I want to wrap up this review because it's already gone on long enough and I don't need to keep looping about how intellectually, creatively, and morally devoid of life Clay Martin really is. In the end I can't even review the 'plot' of this book, because there is no plot. This book is a hundred-some-odd pages of Clay Martin saying something to the effect of "I am a military sheepdog warrior-poet based and redpilled tradmale who hates gay people, women, and black people, and I love andrew tate and donald trump, and non-whites, LGBT people, and muslims are unambigiously evil and should be removed/killed". And whenever you push back on this rhetoric, Martin has the audacity in his novel to say to the character pushing back on this rhetoric "Um, you're being awfully intolerant, I think YOU'RE the racist here". This actually happens on multiple occasions.

I want to end on something of a comparison here, it's something I thought about a while back.

Two of Sylvester Stallone's biggest films were Rocky and Rambo, released within 5 years of each other in 1976 and 1982 respectively. Some men are Rocky men and some men are Rambo men.

Rocky is a film wherein the titular character is poor as hell and struggles with his own insecurities, self-loathing, and frailties. Often the suffering he endures is at his own hand and he is a chronic underachiever and knows it. It is a film about Rocky's father figure having disgust for him that comes from a place of love, disappointment in who rocky has chosen to become, and his disappointment with his own younger self. The movie is largely about Rocky building himself up emotionally, learning to be more, to be different, to improve himself and be a better man and to shoot for the moon. It is about Rocky becoming a better man largely through his emotional work and efforts, and about himself and a broken woman filling the gaps in each other's lives painfully and awkwardly, and then building each other up. At the end of the film Rocky loses the fight but it doesn't matter because Rocky finally feels like he is "worth it" as a human being, he realizes he has inherent value, he has bettered himself and he knows that he can improve and be a better person than he was. Mickey doesn't care that Rocky loses because Rocky finally found, in himself, what Mickey already knew was there, which is what any worthwhile father wants for his son, fulfillment and self-respect. At its core Rocky is a movie about love, both external and internal.

Rambo is a Stallone film in which the titular character is Vietnam special forces man John Rambo, also a broken man who has seen many hardships and gone through hell. He comes home and is harassed by civilians, gets in trouble with local law enforcement in a small town, and this pushes him to his breaking point. At this point Rambo reacts with anger and violence and fear at the world around him, lashing out at everyone and refusing to calm down or talk or take responsibility for his own actions -- perhaps understandably so given his mental state, but regardless, he never admits his own wrongdoing. While he deliberately avoids killing the people trying to catch him (except Galt, who also tried to kill Rambo) many of his actions very easily could have resulted in deaths. Ultimately he does surrender and back down but only after they fly in his commanding officer who orders him to stand down and give up. A movie about men being pushed to the brinking point and reacting with violence, it is about breaking down in a destructive way rather than building up in a constructive way. Rambo lashes out at the world around him when confronted because he is afraid and refuses to communicate. He does try to surrender but then the world reacts negatively to him trying to acquiesce. Rambo is ultimately misunderstood by people who don't want to listen to him.

The point is that some men relate more to Rocky Balboa -- a character who endured great hardship and identify with that and the world beating down on them, but choose to lift themselves and the others around them up and grow as people, embracing the love around and within them and using it to strengthen themselves, and others identify more with John Rambo -- a character who also endured great hardship that they identify with and the world beating down on them. The thing is Rambo ultimately views himself as a victim and lashes out with violence and prejudice towards the people he deems to have wronged him, who is fearful of the people who are 'different' from him because they could 'never understand his experiences', and who does not attempt to communicate with the others around him in any meaningful way. This is not to say that John Rambo is a bad person, or that he is not sympathetic, but that people who identify more strongly with him more often view themselves as unjust victims and seek to tear others down to assuage their own fears and desires.

Clay Martin is a Rambo man. A sad, pathetic, small Rambo man who cannot write.

[Reading Cat · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's an interesting read. It intentionally or not models itself on things like More's Utopia, where there's very little actual story and a lot of Hythlodaeus taking every little minor action or detail as a springboard into another talking point.

We never see real Cascadia, we only have Hansen to go by, (Again, like Utopia or News from Nowhere) but it appears to be a mashup of Sparta warrior culture, tradwife, and various generally European based religions. Hansen says they vote (well, only the men), but it also seems to be more tribal.

I wish Martin had spent more time ravaging the 'normies', the non Cascadians, as that is where the Cascadians really would stand out as a starker counterexample.

There are several items that are straight outta Qanon--the idea of a satanic Cabal, devil worship, human sacrifice, and a few outright antisemitic conspiracy theories--minus the depopulation agenda. It also very much valorizes martial masculinity.

Hansen is, I'm going to be honest, a pretentious twat. He talks down to everyone, and I get it he thinks his culture is superior and all, but if the medium is the message, the medium is a jerk.

I won't spoiler the end, except to say the POV shift is jarring and I think there are other ways to have kept the ending but with the POV of an already known character. (Someone watching it on TV or reading a classified report, or something).

It also could have used an actual editor, or a proofreader to clean up the language, if nothing else.

The reason people like this book seems to be that...it's kind of plausible. No, I don't mean Tonn and his self-important legend of out Nativing the Native Americans or whatever. I mean the fracture of the country into the progressive and the conservative, however you politically slice that pie. I've seen more and more talk on social media about a second civil war and this is entirely plausible and Martin is at his best when he describes the military actions and psychological values of them.

I also find that part of the story plausible and it's frankly unsettling. As an older female I don't have a place in EITHER of the societies Martin creates--unlike the predominantly male fans of this book who clearly connect to the Cascadians.

[Karite · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's an unhinged political rant/manifesto written by a writer who can't write.

The worldbuilding is awful, the characters are either cartoonishly evil or in the case of Marsh's character --- naive/having the personality of wet carboard, and the wish fulfillment Gary Stu character that is Hansen Jr and his father make characters like Coldsteel seem nuanced in comparison.

I've read countless books from authors whose political or religious or cultural beliefs I hate or disagree with, and many of them I consider to be my favorite books --- because those writers actually have talent. They know how to tell a story and do basic character development. Their worldbuilding is interesting and inspired. Clay Martin isn't one of those writer's --- he's just an edgelord who considers himself to be far more intelligent/talented than he actually is.

It's an edgelord-y and violent power fantasy that has a very simplistic, worldview that actively ruins any potential this setting and story would have for being interesting.

[Jim "El Sotong" · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clay Martin has written quite a tale, sketching out the Civil War 2.0 and the aftermath, with many surprising twists and ideas throughout.
The story follows a few central characters, with one dominating the character arcs, General Hansen of Cascadia. His tale goes back to the break up of the United States when folks have said enough is enough. The Federals are not ready, but eventually re-coalesce. He is sent forth from the Forest Republic to send a message to the elites ruling the USA.
This book is both entertaining and informative. It will get you thinking in ways that are new, maybe uncomfortable and possibly alien to you. This is important, as that is when learning starts.
I found the book very enjoyable, extremely thought provoking, and unfortunately painting events that are not implausible.

[C K · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engaging US special ops fiction but WARNO, all the triggers/bias. Valhalla gated with hot, funny Valkyries. Monasteries of sterilized prostitutes that retire to be shamans. A new Sparta where only women publicly have to declare that their # of sexual partners and don’t have the right to vote.

Stated racial bias towards Western Europeans/Indigenous people of North America (Asians are dismissed as a whole as docile/having a herd mentality)

So as a woman with Asian kids this is kind of like reading Bukowski, Kerouac, Evangelical Christian or classic Colonial Lit. Interesting premise/style but understood that the author thinks I shouldn’t vote and that my kids lineage puts them at a genetic/spiritual disadvantage.

[ShaiWarsh · Rating 4 out of 5]

After 5 chapters i was hooked. The last 5-6 chapters lost me.
When the book sticks to the post-American or Alternative Future parts, it shines. But delving into magic and occult is where it skids off the track.
Writing is a bit stiff at time, but still a fun read.
Though i like the connections from the story's future to our present day insanity, at times it seems to borrow a little bit too much (in terms, names or events from the last 2-3 years instead of bigger trends etc.) which in turn makes it feel unimaginative.
All in all a nice read, i do like the effort.

[Isaac · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like "Utopia" by Thomas More, but for conservatives in modern day America. The plot is very limited and serves as a convenient way to push out Martin's ideal American future. As a Utopia, I think it is great. As a book, not as much.

Martin also struggles with how to reconcile widely differing religious and moral beliefs into a coherent opposition force to the One World Order. Granted that is a difficult problem, but I am not sure he adequately solved it.

[Phillip J. Pechek · Rating 5 out of 5]

awesome story

The start was a bit slow and seemingly predictable. However the story progressed in surprising ways from there. It included a very interesting take on our current situation from what might be an insider view. The mystical aspect was a bit over the top, though very entertainingly told.

[jim kenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Blueprint for a society, and an insurgency.

You know, when I read Dune I think "This is what the future could hold, if humanity was just smarter." Now I think the same about Cascadians.

[Talon Larson · Rating 4 out of 5]

a little out there but one potential vision of the future.

[Mike Gallagher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent! Can't wait to read the next one

[jared h smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nowadays, this is plausible.

It's an interesting book filled with stories of magic & treachery. As all good stories go, the bad guys lost.

[Matt Perry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent story overall, but it was virtually all exposition and story-telling through dialog. Got kind of monotonous.

[Payton Punteney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very creative and at times accurate. Be ready for an open mind, controversy, and conflict, but also an optimistic outlook for a better future when conflict has ended.

[Christian Cuen · Rating 3 out of 5]

just ok

Strange story to be sure, but worth an afternoon of reading. This is my first time reading one of Clay’s books and I will give him another chance.

[Jon Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome

I picked this book up and read it in one night and a morning, then read it again. It’s fantastic.

[King Geedorah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great thought experiment about what a future America would look like post civil war/disolving of the United States.

[Case Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thinly veiled (fan)fiction, indeed. Martin does a decent job of laying out a lot of the issues that are currently wrong with the nation and what could and would be a realistic future in the country tearing itself apart. Where the book really falls flat is in his telling of the how and why, in an attempt to point out all the many things wrong with society today, he does so in a way where it appears he doesn't want to offend anyone. Foreshadowing this with the author's note that suggests this story was given to him by mystical forces and compulsion, a convenient way to keep himself at arms length to any that would be offended. Hansen (the main protagonist) waxes expositional for most of the book pointing out all that is wrong with the country left from the remnants of the U.S. of A., and yet manages to hedge on nearly every subject. 3 stars because he makes some very compelling arguments and addresses many of the issues facing society today, but without conviction and gravitas to condemn it in every feasible way. In that shortcoming, it just reads more like an very right-leaning fan-fiction about what could never be.

[Brent · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. A compelling read full of symbolism and archetypes that Americans who love light and truth should study.

(The text could use an editor’s touch.)