INTRODUCTION
Before you read this book, let's get one thing straight. You didn't hear any of this from me. I don't want people coming to me and complaining, take over the world, because now we have to bow down before him or her and do his or her bidding!" (Which, you have to admit, is a pretty awkward thing to say.) Nuh-uh. I've got enough headaches without having to listen to your whiny underlings griping about how diabolical that sort of sniveling. So, Rule #1: You didn't hear any of this from me. Got it? As long as you remember Rule #1, you can read the book and we can still be friends, or at least not archenemies.
And whatever you do, do NOT run around telling all of your friends to buy this book. If you do that, your friends are going to want to become Evil Overlords too, and then they're going to tell their friends, who will then tell their friends, and I'll send up selling a million books and making lots of money and...Hang on sec...
Forget everything I just said.
Rule #1: You heard this from me. Tell all your friends. Buy extra copies and give them as gifts to everyone you know. There. Now, as long as you remember Rule #1, you can read the book and we can still be friends. I mean this Rule #1, not the earlier Rule #1; you should have forgotten that one by now. Are we clear? Excellent.
Now that we've gotten Rule #1 out of the way, let me tell you a bit about this marvelous gem of a book you're holding. As you have probably already guessed from the title, this lovely little handbook is going to teach you everything you need to know to conquer the planet in ten easy steps. (Okay, so it might actually be thirteen or fourteen easy steps, but rounding it off to "ten easy steps" just sounds so much better, don't you think? I mean, honestly, who ever heard of doing anything in "fourteen easy steps"? Not me. So if you see me fudging the numbers a little, just go with it.)
If fact, by the time you're doing reading, and rereading, and heck, let's just say devouring this wonderfully clever book (and telling all your friends and buying lots of extra copies), you will have learned everything you need to know to have entire countries simultaneously groveling at your feet, chewing on their fingernails, and quaking in their baby booties. Seriously. You're going to learn all sorts of important stuff, including how to:
- Become a genius overnight -
-Think up your new Mad Scientist name
- Equip your underground lair
- Build evil robots
- Stop time for fun and profit
- Dress for conquest
- Clone mutant monsters
- Recruit minions
- Construct doomsday devices
- Defeat secret agents
- Perfect your diabolical laugh
- Choose your Mad Scientist theme song
- Spend your first billion dollars
- Do some other junk
Doesn't that sound insanely fantastic? Of course it does. That's why I wrote this book. "But wait!" I hear you grousing. "If you know how to do all this amazing stuff, how come you don't rule the world yourself?" That's easy. I...uh...wait...uh... Fine. I admit it. I'm too lazy. Happy now? I'd rather sleep in all morning and spend a couple of afternoons writing a book than lead battalions of nuclear destructo-bots in a quest for world domination. Which leaves the field wide open for you. All you have to do is read this book and carefully follow the instructions I've laid out, and in no time at all you will be laughing maniacally as the world cowers before you. Or something like that. So if you're ready, let's begin.

STEP 1
BECOMING A GENIUS OVERNIGHT

If you've decided to become an Evil Genius, you're probably not going to have too much trouble with the evil part. After all, you just have to decide to be rotten and despicable instead of good and kind, right?
No? How about this, then? You lose the one thing or person that means the most to you and feel that all of humanity is somehow responsible, ultimately going insane and vowing to take revenge on mankind by destroying all that is fluffy and cute in the world. Better? Excellent. See, I told you being evil wasn't hard.
The genius part, on the other hand, may seem a bit more challenging. You can't just decide to become ten times smarter and do it overnight, after all. Or can you?
In this chapter we'll look at some simple things you can do to increase your intelligence to genius levels with almost no effort.
If you're going to become a genius, we'd better define exactly what a genius is. If you look in any dictionary, you'll find lots and lots of pages, with many, many words on each page. It could take you several minutes just to find the word genius, and then several more minutes to read and understand the definition. Not a very smart use of time. On the other hand, if you just ask your mom what a genius is, she could probably tell you right away. If she can't, maybe you can get her to look it up and tell you what it says. That's still going to be quicker and easier than looking it up yourself.
So who's the genius? The person who wastes time looking things up in the dictionary or the person who gets other people to do the hard work for them? It doesn't take a genius to know the answer to that one.

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Excerpted from The Ultimate Top Secret Guide to Taking over the World by Kenn Nesbitt
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.