Underneath the horrific, violent, and depressing tones of this book lie some of life's tougher questions. Which is better: the man who chooses to be bad or the one who is forced to do good? Are the youth of today solely responsible for their own actions, or do older generations have a role? What is the purpose of criminal justice, to punish or to rehabilitate? Is a "good" person purely good and a "bad" person purely bad, or is it more complicated than that? When "what goes around comes around," as it does to Alex, is that justice? And most importantly, introduced by the presence of the final chapter which was excluded from the American edition for over 20 years: can people change their ways?