Abaddon's Gate (Expanse, #3)

by James S.A. Corey

Violence is what people do when they run out of good ideas. It’s attractive because it’s simple, it’s direct, it’s almost always available as an option. When you can’t think of a good rebuttal for your opponent’s argument, you can always punch them in the face.

The Expanse as a project is pretty skeptical of the idea of redemptive violence. Killing your way to a better tomorrow is a fairly common – and often unexamined – structure in storytelling. There’s a five-page comic called The Flawed Concept of “Good vs. Evil”: The Philosophy of Hayao Miyazaki that’s worth tracking down that speaks to this too. You can google for it. We’ll wait here