The plot of novel consists of nine, connected, yet separate, episodes. A reoccurring term is the three laws of robotics.

They are:

"1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the first law.
3. A robot must protest its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the first or second law."

These laws affect all the stories in the novel. For example in the first chapter, "Robbie", a small and dainty girl named Gloria, taunts the robot, yet the robot cannot seem to put reinforcements back towards her. Another problem occurs when the robots start to think like humans. In one particular chapter the deficient logic goes so extreme that one of the robots seizes power and...