Clojure is "tough" - it's not like going from Java to Ruby or from perl to Go. It's really alien, and takes a while to forget old habits and form new ones. My suggestion is: play with the REPL as much as you can. As for books: "Clojure for the Brave and True" to get started, and the very excellent "The Joy of Clojure" when you start to see the light.