A collection of loosely related short stories that all centre around conflicts between artificial intelligences and their human creators. Each story can be read separately or as part of a whole. There are nine stories in total which, taken together, chronicle the progressive stages of humanity's development of Artificial intelligence (AI); from rudimentary 'helper' robots to a planetary wide economic management system. 
 Each story is basically a thought experiment based around the three laws of robotics that Asimov outlines on a separate page at the beginning of the book (and are included in Goodread's synopsis of the book). 
 Asimov's scenic descriptions are generally strong but, as is so often the case in sci-fi, the characters and their interactions repeatedly drag the stories down. While the characters aren't exactly cardboard cut-outs, they are all extremely temperamental. A lot of the characters seem to be on the verge of some kind of rage fit; slamming fists on tables and calling each other fools and idiots simply because someone misunderstood something. This doesn't come across as Asimov assigning a particular character quirk but as a general mode of behaviour for any human that populates his stories. If this is Asimov trying to make some kind of social commentary about flawed humans then I think he's missed the mark. I couldn't relate to any of the characters because they seemed irrationally angry (even given the situations they were in) and didn't seem like an accurate representation of humanity. 
 The stories are all crammed full of poor dialogue where characters are constantly explaining technical information to one another, information they should both obviously have an understanding of e.g. "We all know what the third law of robotics is but let me reiterate it for you once more." etc. This technique for explaining things for the reader constantly breaks any narrative flow and really dulls the believability of the characters and their situation. 
 The strongest story is probably the first (Robbie) which mostly owes its strength to the fact that the techno-babble is at a minimum (relatively) and there is a much stronger emphasis on characters and their relationships (in this case between a young girl and her 'nurse' robot). 
 Asimov does create some moments of tension between humans and the various forms of AI they create and routinely underestimate but these moments are often short lived (perhaps owing to the nature of short story narratives) and since I didn't relate to the characters I didn't have much invested in the outcomes of the various conflicts. 
 Fans of sci-fi will definitely find enough in Asimov's writing but readers looking for something with more balance (between, for example, scientific exposition and character development) will probably be disappointed.