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See the original CHERUB spy series by Robert Muchamore in order, with mission summaries, character guides, series background and suggestions on the best place to begin.

Last updated: December 22, 2025

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Publication Order

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31 books

1

New Guard

by Robert Muchamore

2016

2

Lone Wolf

by Robert Muchamore

2014

3

Black Friday

by Robert Muchamore

2013

4

Guardian Angel

by Robert Muchamore

2012

5

People's Republic

by Robert Muchamore

2011

6

Shadow Wave

by Robert Muchamore

2010

7

Shadow Wave

by Robert Muchamore

2010

On his final CHERUB mission, James targets a corrupt ex‑Brigands leader now profiting from a controversial tsunami‑relief project in Asia. Back in Britain, Lauren and friends stage a daring protest that forces the government to confront its own failures.

8

Brigands M.C.

by Robert Muchamore

2009

9

Brigands M.C.

by Robert Muchamore

2009

Years after watching biker gang Brigands M.C. murder his family, Dante Scott joins CHERUB and gets a second chance at them. Undercover with James and Lauren inside the club, he must decide whether he wants justice, revenge, or both.

10

The Sleepwalker

by Robert Muchamore

2008

11

The Sleepwalker

by Robert Muchamore

2008

When a packed passenger jet explodes over the Atlantic, investigators suspect terrorism but have no leads. Lauren and Jake follow a troubled boy who believes his father caused the crash, uncovering a smuggling ring that treats safety rules as expendable.

12

The General

by Robert Muchamore

2008

13

The General

by Robert Muchamore

2008

James joins a joint British‑American war game in the Nevada desert while infiltrating an anarchist group buying weapons. Pranks on a US army base, shady arms deals and a wild trip to Las Vegas collide in one chaotic operation.

14

Dark Sun

by Robert Muchamore

2008

15

Dark Sun

by Robert Muchamore

2008

Rat and Andy attend a gaming sleepover at the home of a suspected nuclear‑technology dealer’s son. Between midnight hacking sessions and sudden violence, they race to copy crucial files from the father’s laptop before he realises his house has been bugged.

16

The Fall

by Robert Muchamore

2007

17

The Fall

by Robert Muchamore

2007

Working in a collapsing Russian company town, James sees a weapons deal go catastrophically wrong, leaving two MI5 agents and their target dead. Hauled back to Britain and suspended, he battles rumours and politics while CHERUB investigates what really happened.

18

Mad Dogs

by Robert Muchamore

2007

19

Mad Dogs

by Robert Muchamore

2007

After a CHERUB agent is stabbed infiltrating the Slasher Boys gang, James is sent to join rival crew the Mad Dogs. Navigating turf wars, drug deals and a sadistic CHERUB instructor back home, he risks being swallowed by the gang world he is meant to stop.

20

Man vs. Beast

by Robert Muchamore

2006

21

Man vs. Beast

by Robert Muchamore

2006

James and Lauren penetrate a violent animal‑rights group planning extreme stunts against labs and factory farms. As protests escalate into kidnapping and live‑streamed torture, the siblings struggle to stay undercover without becoming accomplices.

22

Divine Madness

by Robert Muchamore

2006

23

Divine Madness

by Robert Muchamore

2006

James, Lauren and Dana infiltrate The Survivors, a wealthy Australian cult secretly bankrolling eco‑terrorist attacks. Between elite boarding schools, remote desert compounds and staged miracles, they must expose the money trail before a huge gas‑terminal explosion kills thousands.

24

The Killing

by Robert Muchamore

2005

25

The Killing

by Robert Muchamore

2005

Sent to investigate small‑time crook Leon Tarasov’s sudden riches, James embeds himself with Leon’s family and befriends his kids. A routine job quickly uncovers a cover‑up surrounding an unexplained death, and James must decide who he can trust.

26

Maximum Security

by Robert Muchamore

2005

27

Maximum Security

by Robert Muchamore

2005

Posing as brothers, James and Dave get themselves jailed in a tough Arizona prison to befriend Curtis Key, teenage son of an elusive arms dealer. Breaking Curtis out is only the start of a plan to track his mother and missing missiles.

28

The Recruit

by Robert Muchamore

2004

29

The Recruit

by Robert Muchamore

2004

After his mother’s death, trouble‑prone James Choke is offered a fresh start at CHERUB, a covert spy organisation that trains children. Surviving brutal basic training, he is thrown straight into a mission to stop eco‑terrorists targeting an international oil conference.

30

The Dealer / Class A

by Robert Muchamore

2004

James and fellow cherubs move into a London housing estate to infiltrate cocaine kingpin Keith Moore’s family. By befriending Moore’s children and slipping into his operation, they hope to map the supply chain and bring down a major drug network.

31

The Dealer

by Robert Muchamore

2004

Series background & context

The original CHERUB series is where Robert Muchamore’s world of child spies begins. It follows James Adams, a sharp but troubled boy from a rough London estate, who is recruited into a secret division of British intelligence that uses children as undercover agents.

Life on CHERUB campus is a mix of boarding school, military base and summer camp. New recruits endure a notoriously brutal hundred‑day basic training course that strips away bad habits and teaches everything from languages and martial arts to survival skills. Once they earn their coveted T‑shirts, agents juggle normal lessons, friendships and crushes with sudden call‑ups to missions.

Each book throws James, his sister Lauren and their friends at a different slice of the adult world. In Class A they infiltrate a cocaine gang by befriending the dealer’s kids. Maximum Security sends James inside an American prison to break out the son of an arms dealer. Later stories see cherubs tackle eco‑terrorists, religious cults in the Australian outback, violent animal‑rights groups, biker gangs, people smugglers and corrupt businessmen profiting from disaster relief.

Part of the appeal is that the books do not shy away from messy details. Missions go wrong, people get hurt and James regularly makes bad decisions about friends, girlfriends and authority figures. The campus politics promotions, black shirts, grudges with instructors are as vivid as the undercover work. Readers watch James grow from an angry eleven‑year‑old into a more reflective seventeen‑year‑old facing retirement from the only life he has known.

Running beneath the action is a found‑family thread. Many cherubs arrive from broken homes or foster care, and the organisation offers them structure, opportunity and a team that has their back. At the same time, the books leave space for awkward questions about using children in dangerous roles, and they show how different characters handle that pressure.

The sequence is also tightly connected to Muchamore’s other work. Hints about CHERUB’s wartime origins are explored fully in Henderson’s Boys, while the later CHERUB 2 books bring James back as an adult mission controller overseeing a new generation of agents. You can read the original series on its own and get a complete, satisfying arc, or treat it as the core of a larger universe that stretches from World War Two to contemporary counter‑terrorism.

If you are new to Muchamore, starting with The Recruit and reading through to Shadow Wave gives you the full James Adams story a fast, sometimes brutal, always engaging ride through the kinds of missions most adults never see.

Edited by

Richard Reis

Software engineer whose passion for tracking book recommendations from podcasts inspired the creation of MRB.

Anurag Ramdasan

Lead investor at 3one4 Capital whose startup expertise and love for books helped shaped MRB and its growth.

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All 31 CHERUB Books in Order (Complete List 2026)