The book opens with Detective Kim Mager reflecting on the 2016 case that would define her career. She introduces herself as a veteran detective in Ashland, Ohio, describing the challenges of being one of the few women in her department and how her upbringing prepared her for difficult police work. The narrative quickly shifts to a tense 911 call from a woman whispering that she has been abducted and is lying beside her sleeping captor, serial killer Shawn Grate. As officers race to locate her without alerting him, Mager foreshadows that this rescue will lead to an extraordinary series of interrogations in which she must gain the trust of a dangerous murderer and obtain confessions to multiple killings.

The introduction explains that health is a dynamic, lifelong process influenced by personal choices, behaviors, environments, relationships, and access to healthcare resources. The book encourages readers to become active participants in managing their own health by developing knowledge, critical-thinking skills, and healthy behaviors.

Key themes include:

• A holistic view of health: The introduction presents health as more than the absence of disease. It includes multiple dimensions such as physical, emotional, intellectual, social, spiritual, and environmental health.
• Personal responsibility and empowerment: Readers are encouraged to evaluate their own health behaviors, set realistic goals, and make informed choices that support long-term wellness.
• Health literacy: The book emphasizes the importance of understanding health information, evaluating health claims, and becoming a critical consumer of health products and services.
• Behavior change: The introduction highlights that lasting health improvements require awareness, motivation, planning, and gradual changes in daily habits.
• Prevention and wellness: A major focus is preventing illness and promoting healthy lifestyles through nutrition, physical activity, stress management, responsible decision-making, and risk reduction.
• Relationships and society: Health is influenced by family, culture, communities, and social conditions; building healthy relationships and communication skills contributes to overall well-being.

The introduction explains that advertising and promotion are important elements of modern marketing communication, helping organizations create awareness, communicate value, build brands, and influence consumer behaviour. The authors present advertising as more than a simple business tool; it is also a cultural and social practice that shapes meanings, identities, and relationships between brands and audiences. The book introduces the importance of understanding strategy, creativity, media choices, consumer responses, and the wider social effects of promotional activities. It aims to provide students with a critical understanding of how advertising works by combining marketing theory, industry examples, and perspectives from fields such as media studies and sociology.

The book introduces human language and linguistics—the systematic study of how language works. It explains that language is much more than simply a collection of words: it is a complex system with rules that allow people to create and understand an unlimited number of meaningful expressions.

The introduction prepares students to study several major aspects of language, including:

1. What language is — the nature and characteristics of human language.
2. The brain and language — how language is related to the human brain.
3. Morphology — how words are formed and structured.
4. Syntax — how words are organised into sentences.
5. Semantics — how language conveys meaning.
6. Phonetics and phonology — how speech sounds are produced and organised.
7. Language acquisition — how children learn language.
8. Language processing — how humans understand and produce language.
9. Language and society — how language varies according to social and cultural factors.
10. Language change and writing — how languages develop over time and how writing represents language.

The introduction provides a foundation for understanding investment analysis and portfolio management. The book focuses on how investors can evaluate investment opportunities and construct portfolios that match their risk and return objectives.

1. What is an investment?

An investment means committing money or other resources today with the expectation of receiving benefits or income in the future.

Examples include:

• Shares (stocks)
• Bonds
• Real estate
• Mutual funds
• Derivative securities

The introduction explains that performance management is a continuous process for improving individual and organizational effectiveness. It emphasizes that managing performance is not simply about annual appraisals or judging employees; rather, it involves creating a shared understanding of goals, supporting employees, providing feedback, and developing capability to achieve better results.

Key themes include:

• Meaning of performance management:
  Performance management is presented as a structured approach that links organizational objectives with individual and team contributions. It helps employees understand expectations and how their work supports broader business goals.
• Beyond traditional performance appraisal:
  The introduction explains that effective performance management is broader than periodic reviews. It includes ongoing conversations, coaching, feedback, learning, and support for improvement.
• Alignment with organizational strategy:
  A central purpose of performance management is ensuring that employee objectives are connected to the organization’s mission, priorities, and desired outcomes.

The introduction explains the growing importance of business excellence as organizations face increasing competition, changing customer expectations, and the need for continuous improvement. It introduces the idea that excellence is not achieved through isolated improvements but through a structured approach that examines leadership, strategy, processes, people, resources, and results. The authors discuss how business excellence models, such as quality awards and self-assessment frameworks, help organizations understand their current performance and identify opportunities for improvement. The book aims to provide managers and students with practical guidance on using excellence frameworks to measure performance, encourage organizational learning, and achieve sustainable improvement.

The introduction explains why statistics is important in business and how statistical methods help managers make better decisions.

1. What is statistics?

Statistics is the science of collecting, organizing, presenting, analyzing, and interpreting data.

For example, a company may collect information about:

• Customer satisfaction
• Sales
• Prices
• Employee performance
• Advertising effectiveness
• Market demand

Statistics helps turn this information into useful conclusions.

2. Why businesses use statistics

Businesses operate with uncertainty. Managers cannot know exactly what customers will buy or what will happen in the future.

The introduction explains that statistics is an essential tool for business professionals because organizations must make decisions based on data, uncertainty, and changing conditions. The book presents statistics as a practical method for collecting, organizing, analyzing, interpreting, and presenting information to support effective decision-making.

Key themes include:

• The role of statistics in business:
  Statistics helps managers and analysts understand patterns, evaluate performance, forecast future outcomes, and make informed decisions using evidence rather than assumptions.
• Data collection and analysis:
  The introduction emphasizes that reliable statistical conclusions depend on properly collecting, organizing, and evaluating data from business environments.
• Descriptive and inferential statistics:
  The text introduces two major areas:
  • Descriptive statistics — methods for summarizing and displaying data using tables, charts, and numerical measures.
  • Inferential statistics — methods for drawing conclusions or making predictions about a larger population using sample information.

The introduction explains the purpose and scope of International Relations (IR) as the study of political, economic, social, and security relationships among states and other global actors. The field examines how countries interact, how global systems are organized, and how conflicts and cooperation develop in an interconnected world.

Key ideas introduced include:

• Understanding global politics: International relations explores events and processes that shape the world beyond national borders, including diplomacy, war, trade, international organizations, and global challenges.
• Theories of international relations: The book introduces major theoretical approaches that help explain world politics, such as realism, liberalism, constructivism, and critical perspectives.
• Actors in world politics: While states remain central, the field also considers international organizations, multinational corporations, non-governmental organizations, social movements, and individuals.
• Traditional and emerging issues: The study of IR includes traditional concerns such as security and conflict, as well as newer issues such as globalization, human rights, environmental change, and global inequality.
• Critical analysis: The introduction encourages students to examine not only what happens in world politics but also why events occur and how different perspectives interpret them.