Those who write for The New Yorker apparently believe in the abysmal boredom of life outside their city. Max Magee writes: “In revisiting all of the stories, one major over-arching theme emerged for me, the conflict between stories that center on what I call ‘suburban malaise’ (born out of ‘The Swimmer’ and ‘What We Talk about When We Talk about Love’ among many others) and those that don’t.”