The Natural is a 1952 novel about baseball written by Bernard Malamud . The book follows Roy Hobbs, a baseball prodigy whose career is sidetracked when he is shot by a crazed serial killer. Most of the story concerns itself with his attempts to return to baseball later in life, when he plays for the fictional New York Knights with his legendary bat 'Wonderboy'.
Based upon the unfortunate shooting and subsequent comeback of Phillies player Eddie Waitkus , the story of Roy Hobbs takes some poetic license and embelishes what was truly a strange, but memorable account of a career lost too soon.