The Recruit: Bk. 1 (CHERUB) Book

Absolutely brilliant, and it's true I wish it was true! Can't wait for the film (if there's ever going to be one - there should be) and I want to be in it! Carrie, age 49, Lancashire

Cherub: The recruit, is the first in the series of cherub books, which are mainly known by teenagers because of their extreme attitude and movie style.

Many books today hold back on explicit details or true feelings of excitement and danger, but this book creates it so easily. Any teenager who reads this will want to read it again and again.

The plot is a uniquely twisted one, with several hidden meanings, which follows the life of James, a classic trouble maker who is the hero of this book. When James gets expelled from school for assaulting a 15 year old girl, he doesn't know what he will do. Also, at this time his uncle Ron comes to his house to steal money off James' mother. He gets her drunk in order to steal the money, but because of her heart condition she dies. James is taken into a dingy cramped and crowded orphanage where the food is poor and the kids steal off one another to survive. He gets mixed in with some of the wrong crowd and ends up committing serious acts of vandalism.

This plot is punchy, gory and not afraid to chuck you right in. Robert Muchamore has captured the spirit of a teenagers life and has written in a way that is so unique and yet so common in the lives of today's teenagers. What I really admire about this book is in the way the author gives you sense of all the feelings involved. With this book it's not just words on a page, they are the thoughts you'd be thinking if you were involved.

The book's plot twists onward with a series of unexpected events that always leave you guessing and never being able to fully unravel the extensive plot.

One part of the book that is the main attraction for teenagers and I think is the main example of Robert's impressive writing style, is where he addresses the issue of sexual relationships between teens. He is not afraid to go into detail but never pushes it so far that it is offensive or too detailed. He just gives the reader subtle clues and occasional bursts of passion showing the spiralling convoluted path of a teenager's love life.

This books vibrant and vivid path is an exciting fresh new genre of its own that readers will be hooked by. But the one point I think it is very important to make is that this book is meant to be gritty, passionate and exciting and this review in itself is almost shaming what the book is all about.

The phrase "schools out" I think applies here because of this book throwing away all the rules of how a book should be written and all the rules of being able to analyse it. Robert Muchmore has not written Shakespeare, a book to be picked apart by an English class; he has written an exciting thriller that people want to read because it's good.

Chosen as a World Book Night 2014 title and a previous winner of the Red House Children's Book Award, CHERUB: The Recruit is the first entry in Robert Muchamore's bestselling series. A terrorist doesn't let strangers in her flat because they might be undercover police or intelligence agents, but her children bring their mates home and they run all over the place. The terrorist doesn't know that a kid has bugged every room in her house, cloned the hard drive on her PC, and copied all the numbers in her phone book. The kid works for CHERUB. CHERUB is not James Bond. There are no master criminals or high-tech gadgets. CHERUB kids live in the real world. They slip under adult radar and get information that sends criminals and terrorists to jail. For official purposes, these children do not exist.

A new cover look for the number one bestselling CHERUB series! In the first title, James hits rock bottom before he's offered a new start in an intriguing organisation ... A terrorist doesn't let strangers in her flat because they might be...

Robert Muchamore's teen spy series kicks off with a thrill-packed adventure story, starring a fresh and believable hero.

CHERUB: The Recruit features junior MI5.