The Recruit

The Recruit is the first novel in the CHERUB series, written by Robert Muchamore. It introduces most of the main characters, such as James Adams (James Choke), Lauren Adams (Lauren Onions), Kyle Blueman and Kerry Chang. The book itself was originally to be called 'CHERUB 1.0'.

Plot
The book begins with 11 year old James Choke getting sent to a children's care home called Nebraska house, after his mother dies from a alcohol related incident, where he shares a room with best friend Kyle Blueman, a CHERUB agent who recruits him. Meanwhile James' sister Lauren is taken to live with her father Ron Onions a scumbag of a step dad. James gets arrested for trying to steal a beer. Next morning James awakes to find himself on the CHERUB campus where the chairman, Dr Terrence McAfferty - often called 'Mac' - introduces him to CHERUB and puts him through a series of entrance tests which he passes. James is admitted into CHERUB. In order to start going on missions all agents must complete Basic Training. During this James meets Kerry Chang, with whom he has a strong friendship.

James' first mission takes place in the hippy camp Fort Harmony. James and Amy Collins must befriend the hippies at Fort Harmony and find out more about the potential attack at Petrocon 2004 by the terrorist group Help Earth. The two discover a plot to release anthrax bacteria into the air in the conference centre. The police are called in and they raid Fort Harmony to prevent the attack from happening.

Major characters
See also: List of CHERUB characters*James Adams/Choke: The main character, a twelve year old boy whose mother dies from an alcohol overdose. He meets Kyle Blueman at Nebraska house, a children's home. He joins CHERUB and changes his name from Choke to Adams. Later he embarks on a mission to overthrow an eco-terrorist plot.
 * Kerry Chang: Kerry is James's basic training partner. She is one of James's closest friends and has a severe knee injury, which prevented her from completing basic training in the past.
 * Amy Collins: She teaches James to swim and joined him on the mission to infiltrate the Eco terrorist group known as 'Help Earth'.
 * Bruce Norris: Bruce is a master martial artist, but is revealed to behave like a baby. He is one of James' best friends.
 * Kyle Blueman: Kyle is James' best friend. He is the first person James knows at Cherub because of the fact that James shared a bedroom with Kyle at Nebraska house. Kyle is two years older than James' and meets his first girlfriend in the process.

Development and publication
Development for both The Recruit and the CHERUB series as a whole began in 1999 when Muchamore was visiting his sister in Australia and found his twelve year old nephew complaining about the lack of any good reading material.[1] In 2001, Muchamore began working on an unnamed novel, KN1 (Kids novel 1). This was more violent with James slashing Samantha's face open with broken glass.[1] Robert Muchamore did not approach a Literary agent until Autumn 2002. By this time the novel was called CHERUB 1.0. He was rejected by the first agent but taken on by the second. Many different publishing companies disliked the novel and rejected Muchamore once again. It was in March 2003 that Hodder Children's Books purchased CHERUB 1.0 and an unnamed sequel, both for release in 2004.[1]

Translation
The Recruit has been translated into 20 languages, including:
 * French - "100 jours en enfer" ("100 days in hell")
 * German - "Top Secret: Der Agent"
 * Japanese - "スカウト”　(Scout) source
 * Polish - "Rekrut"
 * Portuguese - "O Recruta"
 * Russian - "Новобранец" (Novobranyets - "The Rookie")
 * Spanish - "Entrenamiento Básico" ("Basic Training")
 * Norwegian - "Rekrutten"
 * Danish - "Ilddåb" ("Firebirth")

Film
In February 2009, it was announced that Jigsaw and BBC Films would together be adapting The Recruit. Muchamore quoted on his website that the film had no set casting date, release date or shooting date, and that he was hoping that the film would be able to start casting sometime in 2011.[citation needed] [2]

Audio book
A 3-CD audiobook was released in the UK on September 21, 2006 read by Julian Rhind-Tutt.

Critical reception
The Recruit received generally good reviews being nominated for 8 awards and winning 7.[3] The Sunday Express described the book as, 'Punchy, exciting, glamorous and, what's more, you'll completely wish it was true.'

Sequel
Main article: Class A (novel)The Recruit is followed by Class A. There James, Kerry, Nicole and Kyle infiltrate a drug cartel led by Keith Moore. Lauren also takes part in basic training and injures Mr. Large.