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Trying to track down this short story about a father who dies but comes back to life as a robotic version of himself. There was this traveling salesman who sold the household on this process whereby the deceased person's mind was implanted into a lookalike robot. The robotic dad is delivered to the household and his young son doesn't want anything to do with it at first. The boy eventually moves away, leaving the robot dad behind. The robot just continues living at the old house (it was in a country setting). It was a bittersweet story and now I can’t remember the collection of short stories it was in!

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    Sounds like something Clifford Simak might have written,
    – user888379
    Commented Feb 25, 2021 at 22:15
  • Thanks for the suggestion.
    – Mike Parkes
    Commented Feb 26, 2021 at 18:22
  • FuzzyBoots thank you for editing my question.
    – Mike Parkes
    Commented Feb 28, 2021 at 3:46
  • I recall a TV show like maybe the 1990s Outer Limits that may have done this story. I do not recall the actor's name, but he was a very big, tall guy who I think started out as a pro football player. In the show, he simply looked human and maybe even his brain was all that was replaced. It was kind of sad but the kid really hated him and the "man" of course thought he was the guy (although he knew he was artificial). This theme has come up a lot -- I remember DS9 where Obrien is replaced by an artificial version set to explode and he wonders why everyone is cold to him.
    – releseabe
    Commented Mar 26, 2023 at 21:04

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I finally tracked this down, the story is 'The Resurrection Man's Legacy' by Dale Bailey. An excellent and haunting story from a collection by the same title. (“The Resurrection Man’s Legacy,” first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July 1995.)

Here is a link to the ebook that contains this story, on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00LF22F8W

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    Glad you found it. We'd be grateful if you'd mark your answer as accepted, which you can do by clicking on the check mark beneath the voting buttons. It's this site's way of formally indicating that a query has been solved to the querent's satisfaction.
    – LogicDictates
    Commented Mar 25, 2023 at 19:48
  • It's also good if you can indicate details of this that match so that other people might find it on a search.
    – FuzzyBoots
    Commented Mar 26, 2023 at 16:34

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