What was the title

[james_davis_nicoll]

of that SF novel where it turned out mass murder was the solution?

Comments

[affreca]

Was it by David Weber? Or Jerry Pournelle?

[dragoness_e]

No (In Weber, mass murder is what the bad guys do, as one might expect).
Yes. (The Mercenary)

[ba_munronoe]

When an author creates a purely evil and menacing alien race with which it is impossible to communicate, so extermination is the only Option, is the problem with the aliens, or the author?

[affreca]

We might be thinking of the same Weber book.

[dragoness_e]

If you mean the Gbaba in the Safehold series, they're a plot device, not a people. They existed to set the constraints for the story's universe. Notice we don't ever actually see them--they might as well be as impersonal and unthinking as Saberhagen's Berserkers.

Otherwise, I'm not sure what you're referring to.

[ba_munronoe]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Death_Ground

[dragoness_e]

I have not read it, however, I know that it is a tie-in novel to a tabletop war game, Starfire (which I have played), and a very early work by David Weber and Steven White. The enemy is essentially a pile of ship stats and logistics numbers pushed around by your opposing player. Note that in the earlier history of the Starfire universe, humanity was able to find common ground with all the other races they fought with, eventually make peace, and sometimes join forces against a bigger threat (in this case, the Bugs).

[graydon]

Weber's used that trope in

1. the Starfire novels, thrice
   
   
   
   • Rigellians (backstory; no novels) (survivors on two planets not exterminated but tech restricted)
   
   
   • the Thebans Crusade (defeated, offered Federation membership)
   
   
   • the Arachnids, aka Bugs, In Death Ground (believed exterminated but not)
   
   
   
   


2. Mutineers Moon and sequels (rescue attempts, citizenship for rescuees; it's really another trope)


3. Safehold; we don't know what happens to the Gbaba and liely won't at the current rate


4. the Apocalypse Troll, where we don't find out what happens to the aliens

[(Anonymous)]

As I recall, the Berserker's were not unthinking.