The 39 Clues: Cahills vs. Vespers, Book 1 of 6

The kids and I recently finished the first eleven-book series of The 39 Clues and were deeply impressed by the final two installments, Into the Gauntlet and Vespers Rising. They were interesting enough to make us long for the story to keep going, and thankfully it does in this shorter series, Cahills vs. Vespers.

I’ll be honest: I didn’t think this series could be extended with as much vim and vigor as the original, but Gordon Korman pulls it off. Where I thought the authors would be forced to rehash old plots or invent in-house squabbles that would give the plot the same cutting edges as before, they’ve instead discovered a completely new method of upping the ante.

In this series, the Cahills—surviving members from all the teams who had fought and sometimes killed each other in the original clue hunt—have now bonded, knowing that their family represents the goodness of their ancestor, Gideon Cahill. Meanwhile, the wickedness of Gabriel’s 16th Century enemy lives on inside the Vesper organization, a vile collection of volunteer ruffians bent on destroying the Cahills once and for all.

Book One in this series opens with a handful of kidnappings, though we’re not quite sure why. As it turns out, Vespers from around the world have organized a plot to blackmail the remaining Cahills into a museum heist that will lead them to what we can only assume is a far greater prize. Dan and Amy Cahill along with a small set of distant cousins band together to pull off the impossible, simply because they have no choice. Their au pair and friend, Nellie has been taken along with the rest, and the children fear that her life is truly in danger.

Besides the Vespers, there are a few other new characters as well in this book. Amy’s boyfriend, Evan, for example, is a guy I don’t trust. Then the siblings that the Cahills meet in Italy, Jake and Atticus, also seem a bit off to me. We’ll have to keep our eyes on them as we progress through the series.

One questionable moment came in Chapter 20 where one character called it a “myth” that Christians were ever fed to wild animals in the Colosseum. I don’t want to be the ignorant buffoon here, but I’d have to argue that history is replete with evidence that such tortures took place, even if not inside the Colosseum itself. So, to make a statement about this “myth” without clarifying that “it did happen just not here” is to place doubt in kids’ minds, that Christians have simply made up their persecuted past or worse (and more likely) that Christians were instead the ones doing the killing—probably of slaves, because Christians are so terrible. It’s a subtle line, perhaps, but that’s how seeds of doubt are planted. Subtle, yet the beginning stages of rewriting history, no matter what the evidence shows.

Twelve books into the series, I’d never come across anything like this—-I mean the whole series is revisionist history! But there’s a pretty vast difference between stating A) that fictional character Dan Cahill is the direct descendent of Mozart and Benjamin Franklin, and B) Christians made up their history of persecution in Rome. I’ve got to keep my eyes open for more “seeds” like this.

We really enjoyed the action and intrigue of this first book in the new series, and we’re looking forward to the next five as well. Next up: A King’s Ransom.

©2024 E.T.

Read More from The 39 Clues: Cahills vs. Vespers:

1. The Medusa Plot by Gordon Korman (2011)
2. A King’s Ransom by Jude Watson (2011)
3. The Dead of Night by Peter Lerangis (2012)
4. Shatterproof by Roland Smith (2012)
5. Trust No One by Linda Sue Park (2012)
6. Day of Doom by David Baldacci (2013)

Read More from Gordon Korman:

• The Emperor’s Code (201)
• The Medusa Plot (2011)
• The Fort (2022)