Locke, Robert Donald
Entry updated 15 December 2025. Tagged: Author.
(? - ) US author who served in the US Air Force during World War Two and began to publish work of genre interest with "Demotion" in Astounding Science-Fiction for September 1952; the rest of his dozen short stories appeared in various sf magazines to 1961, the last being the Parallel Worlds tale Next Door, Next World (April 1961 Analog; 2008 ebook).
Locke used the pseudonym Roger Arcot for one of those shorts and for the novel – long unavailable in book form – The Timeless Man (June-September 1956 Other Worlds; 2015). Its initially 73-year-old protagonist, having undergone unexpected Rejuvenation as a young version of another man rather than of himself, finds himself both in thrall to the mysterious entity Gorken who keeps his minions in line with the bribe of easily withdrawn Immortality, and enlisted by those working to prevent Gorken's impending domination of the world. (His organization's familiar Political tactics include inciting hatred of minorities, here Mutants.) The somewhat confused storyline, strong on Paranoia, involves much violence including a mass attack by feral Rats, such sf props as Force Fields and irresistible Hypnosis, and a final confrontation with Gorken, who proves to be an Alien defeatable only through Time Travel shenanigans. [DRL]
Robert Donald Locke
born
works
- The Timeless Man (Rialto, California: Fiction House Press, 2015) as by Roger Arcot [first appeared June-September 1956 Other Worlds: pb/Virgil Finlay]
collections and stories
- Next Door, Next World (place not given: Project Gutenberg, 2008) [novelette: ebook: first appeared April 1961 Analog: na/]
- G-r-r-r ... ! (place not given: Project Gutenberg, 2009) [story: ebook: first appeared January 1957 Fantastic Universe: na/]
- Deepfreeze (place not given: Project Gutenberg, 2010) [novelette: ebook: first appeared January 1953 Imagination: na/]
- Milk Run (place not given: Project Gutenberg, 2021) [story: ebook: first appeared May 1953 Imagination: na/]
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