Chabon writes that “[o]ne of the sturdiest precepts of the study of human delusion is that every golden age is either past or in the offing. The months preceding the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor offer a rare exception to this axiom” (340). The United States is isolated with regards to the wars happening in Europe and Asia, and for the average New Yorker, the feeling is not “one of siege, panic, or grim resignation to fate but rather the toe-wiggling, tea-sipping contentment of a woman curled on a sofa, reading in front of a fire with cold rain rattling against the windows” (340).

It is one o’clock in the morning and Sam is on duty as a spotter on the top of the Empire State Building. Sam carries a typed list of the seven aircraft that have been granted clearance to fly over the New York metropolitan airspace by Army Interceptor Command. By 11:30 that night, Sam has already spotted six of the planes, and the last isn’t expected until about 5:30 in the morning. Sam is considering whether he should sleep for a few hours in the spotters’ quarters before going to work at Empire Comics.

Sam hears a rumble coming from the elevator.