The prologue of Underworld is a fictionalized account of The Shot Heard 'Round the World, a home run by Bobby Thomson in 1951. The HR won the National League pennant for the New York Giants against their cross-town rivals, the Brooklyn Dodgers. In DeLillo's account, the game-winning ball is caught by a young black fan named Cotter Martin. Meanwhile, J Edgar Hoover is also in the stands that day. During the game, he is informed of the game of the first Soviet test of the hydrogen bomb.
The remainder of Underworld, comprising six parts and an epilogue, is a reverse chronological account of the life of Nick Shay. Shay ends up with the baseball from that game. We read in reverse from his undirected existence as an executive of a waste management company in Arizona in the 1990s back to his childhood in the Bronx in the 1950s. The non-linear narrative includes a large number of digressions and ancillary subplots.
