People's Republic is the start of a new Cherub series. In case you don't know Cherub is a secret organisation - like MI6 except that MI6 isn't secret . . . but it uses children to conduct it's operations. So the Cherub series is like James Bond and Alex Rider but its aimed at more of an older age range. In this book the reader follows 12 year old Ryan Sharma, an agent just out of basic training (basic training is the worst 100 days of your life) who is supposed to go on a routine mission - befriending Ethan Aramov, the grandson of the boss who runs a billion-dollar criminal empire in Kyrgyzstan - but it turns out to be one of the biggest missions in Cherub history. We also follow Fu Ning, an athletic, disruptive Chinese girl adopted by Fu Chaoxiang, a man involved in a human trafficking operation, and Ingrid Miller, an ex-British army scouser. When Chaoxiang gets caught by the police Ingrid and Ning have to leg it to Britain but only get as far as Kyrgyzstan before they get captured by henchmen of Leonid Aramov who is looking to get Ingrid's money. Ning manages to escape but Ingrid isn't so lucky. She gets strangled by Leonid. Ning reaches the Czech Republic and is driven from there through Germany and France and finally reaches England, but her journey doesn't end there . . . After going through a whole lot more Ning makes it to Cherub where she becomes friends with Ryan. This is an explosive read, with action, adventure and you totally wish it was real. I recommend this book to anyone who reads books, that's how good it is.