The Rapture warning occurring a week in advance is not a real-world prediction of what will happen or even a serious proposal for something that could happen. It is a literary setup to probe the culture that we know, like an imposed signal that tests the characteristics of a dynamic system. The system of interest is the world in general and the objects of our faith particular.

The objects of our faith are unseen. We walk by faith, not by sight. Our "blessed hope" is an anticipated worldwide event that we who understand the biblical doctrine long for. Really?

There have been actual tests in the form of prophecies predicting that day if not the hour. There have been impressive demonstrations of faith however misplaced. Those tests selected a tiny minority of Christians who had been conditioned by false prophets, so they are not fair samples that can be extended to the whole church. Would many sane, Bible-literate believers be perfectly willing to discontinue their careers on earth if so tested? In other words, would the Rapture be regarded by everyone as a blessing if we had time to think realistically about it? If not, what does that reveal about the faith we claim to be walking by?

Novels are not scientific experiments, but imaginative literature can be a means of revealing truth and even foretelling the future. Science fiction sometimes does that. Political novels famously have done it. When you build a story using elements of sociology, psychology, geography, history, physics, and theology, it is something like a scientific experiment. When such elements are realistically combined, the result is worthy of serious consideration. This happens all the time. There might be a name for it.

The platform on which the experiment is performed need not be realistic. Even cartoons carry out experiments in social behavior. Maintaining realism (which is strictly impossible) means devoting pages to irrelevant details which, however pleasing the writing may be, would tend to obscure the experiment. The Day and the Hour books contain enough detail to make them pleasant reading, but they cannot be considered realistic novels. For one thing, they employ allegory and overt symbolism.

The allegorical elements are not enough to make it an allegory, and the love story is not quite significant enough to make it that sort of romance. It's length makes it an epic. It might be a drama. What could be more dramatic than a story leading to the end of the age and beyond to the bright days when the kingdom of God is realized on earth?

You will not find gratuitous drama in the Bible and you will not find it here. There is no joy or sorrow that is not rooted in solid ground. Prophets always provide warning. Disaster never strikes unexpectedly.

Of course there is the urgency in the background. How many days are left for us to live on earth?

In order to convey the essential urgency, the present tense is used, and the passing of each hour to the next is noted explicitly. Overlapping events are signaled by temporarily slipping into the past tense. Thus, we have an hour-by-hour drumbeat as the predicted day and hour of the Rapture approaches.

The story purports to be written by one of its characters, Claudia Nice, who is mayor of the nameless town. Claudia is a Roman Catholic. She is also a Rapture skeptic, which it is impossible to be when the facts are known. But she is impossible, so it doesn't matter. Her attention to detail is attested to by footnotes and meticulous formatting whereby the last line of each chapter lands on the last available line of its last left-hand page. When you buy a book, you are not paying for empty pages. Buy them all and get the most for your money.