Robert James Collas Lowry (March 28, 1919 – December 5, 1994) was an American novelist, short story writer, illustrator, and independent press publisher. Lowry was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was a literary wunderkind who began writing at the age of 8; within a year, he had stories published in the Cincinnati Times Star. He graduated from Withrow High School in 1937, after which he entered the University of Cincinnati. He was, according to biographer James Reide, a voracious reader of the literary works of Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Guy de Maupassant.