The problems of social, emotional, and spiritual disintegration in the modern world appear in various forms throughout Barthelme's fiction. These problems as they appear in modern urban life are treated in City Life (1970), where many of the themes that concern Barthelme in Paradise are explored in the smaller scale of the short story. In terms of style, a closely related title is Great Days (1979), which includes several stories that treat dialogue in the same way it is used in many sections of Paradise.