I, Robot Study Guide & Plot Synopsis

I, Robot Plot Summary

Preview of I, Robot Summary:

This book, first published as a whole in 1950, consists of a series of short stories published individually over a period of ten years from 1940 to 1950. The stories are linked by a series of narratives in which the book's central character, an elderly robot psychologist named Susan Calvin, is interviewed shortly before her death. Her recollections within those narratives function alternately as prologue and epilogue, in that they offer either introductory or summary information and perspective.

The first story, "Robbie," is a stand-alone tale about a little girl's deep friendship with a robot and her mother's determined efforts to separate them. The next three stories, "Runaround," "Reason," and "Catch That Rabbit," chronicle the challenges facing a pair of scientists, Donovan and Powell, as they test an increasingly sophisticated series of labor robots, each of which reveals a unique malfunction that ultimately places the lives of the two humans...
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