Product Description

The world's largest urban warfare training compound stands in the desert near Las Vegas. Forty British commandos are being hunted by an entire American battalion. But their commander has an ace up his sleeve: he plans to smuggle in ten CHERUB agents, and fight the best war game ever. CHERUB agents have one crucial advantage: adults never suspect that kids are spying on them. For official purposes, these children do not exist.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #86 in Books
• Published on: 2008-09-04
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Review
Praise for books in the CHERUB series: 'Punchy, exciting, glamorous and, what's more, you'll completely wish it was true.' -- The Sunday Express 'An excellent start to a promising series. It is every boy's wish to be a spy, and this book will enthrall every single one of them.' -- The Bookseller 'An exciting, swiftly moving tale' -- School Librarian 'A fast-paced action thriller, which should turn into a fantastic series - if James manages to live that long.' -- Young Post

Review
Praise for books in the CHERUB series: 'Punchy, exciting, glamorous and, what's more, you'll completely wish it was true.' (The Sunday Express )

'An excellent start to a promising series. It is every boy's wish to be a spy, and this book will enthrall every single one of them.' (The Bookseller )

'An exciting, swiftly moving tale' (School Librarian )

'A fast-paced action thriller, which should turn into a fantastic series - if James manages to live that long.' (Young Post )

Synopsis
The world's largest urban warfare training compound stands in the desert near Las Vegas. Forty British commandos are being hunted by an entire American battalion. But their commander has an ace up his sleeve: he plans to smuggle in ten CHERUB agents, and fight the best war game ever. CHERUB agents have one crucial advantage: adults never suspect that kids are spying on them. For official purposes, these children do not exist.

Customer Reviews

Much ado about Nothing
Robert Muchamore is an author who always delivers - until now!

The first in the Cherub series, The Recruit, had me hooked from the start on the adventures of child spy James Adams and his sister, Lauren. No other spy books - Alex Rider, Young James Bond, Jimmy Coates etc - could touch Cherub for quality, excitement or pure enjoyment.

However, I feel very let down by The General. Much of Muchamore's talent comes from creating believable and likeable characters, characters you invest your emotions in - characters you come to care about. In The General, however, he dwells less on the people and more on the action. His characters become cartoon-like, one-dimensional - with no real depth to them.

The story within The General is also sadly lacking. Although the book enjoys a tense and exciting opening chapter, it rapidly descends into a fiasco of plot, involving plans to rob a Las Vegas casino using MI5 spying equipment and "fighting dirty" in a tedious training exercise. Like another reviewer said, the series really does jump the shark here.

The success of the Cherub series, for me, was that you could 'just about' believe that a spy school for orphan kids was plausible - as crooks would certainly be less wary of kids than adults. However, I found much of the plot of The General - especially that of a teacher plotting with James to commit theft on a grand scale - just too ridiculous to swallow. Perhaps Muchamore is running out of ideas, perhaps he was working to a tight deadline and had to rush things. Whatever the problem, this book is certainly the weakest link in the Cherub chain.

I expected much, much more of Muchamore - but the hype surrounding the release of this book turned out to be much ado about nothing!

generally excellent!
This cherub book is special because instead of starting with a training exercise and ending with a mission it turns it round and starts with a mission and ends with a massive training exercise.The mission and the big training exercise are really good bits of the book which grip you throughout and times which are a bit funny (especially with kazakov who hates americans and trys to start a fight with lots of them).A very good read.

Shocking disappointment
I'm a big fan of this series but I totally agree with the other reviewer that this book is a major disappointment.

There is no excitement in the plot and the characters have become either unbelievable or unlikeable. I am sad to say it looks like this was written in a hurry. Maybe the author had other things on his mind or was too busy now that the series is so successful. the success is deserved because the other books are excellent but this one is a complete dud in my opinion.

I'd recommend rereading the other CHERUB books instead of getting this one or waiting for the next one which will hopefully go back to the standard of the others.

For some genuine excitement try BY ROYAL COMMAND in the YOUNG BOND series by Charlie Higson or the JIMMY COATES books by Joe Craig.