<![CDATA[R.P.L. Johnson

<![CDATA[R.P.L. Johnson - Blog]]>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 19:09:13 -0700Weebly<![CDATA[p(doom)]]>Sun, 09 Nov 2025 08:39:44 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/pdoomWhat does p(doom) mean?

Simply put, it’s the probability of doom, a percentage estimate of the chance of human extinction by AI. Ask an AI researcher what their p(doom) is, and the answer might surprise you.

Geoffrey Hinton (the Godfather of modern AI) says we have “a better than even” chance of avoiding extinction. Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, has a p(doom) of 10 to 25 percent which is close to Elon Musk’s estimate of 20 to 30 percent. The most prominent voices in AI development right now say humanity’s chances of surviving its creation are slightly worse than a game of Russian Roulette!

But how might that doom come about? If AI becomes a problem, won't we just turn it off?

Well, this short story (or rather collection of 4 short-shorts) first appeared in SNAFU: AI Insurrection last year and lays out a few possibilities why that might not be possible.

I try not to write stories with a “message” because they often become preachy and boring, but in this case I’m making an exception. Please read the story and ask yourself, “What’s my p(doom)?”

Cover art by Ivan Zanchetta at Bookcoversart.com

]]><![CDATA[Congratulations Connor]]>Tue, 04 Jun 2024 23:42:38 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/congratulations-connorCongratulations to fellow antipodean, Connor Chamberlain, who was a winner in the 40th anniversary Writers and Illustrators of the Future earlier this year.

Connor is a visual artist and self-proclaimed 'fantasy nerd' from Dunedin, New Zealand. Connor says he draws inspiration from the natural landscape around him and looking through his work on his Instagram page, you can really see that come through.

If you're familiar with my back-story, I won the writers side of this international competition back in 2011, in fact that was my first professional sale. That story earned a cash prize and a trip to Hollywood for a week-long workshop with professional writers like Kevin J Anderson, Tim Powers, Robert J Sawyer and the late, great Mike Resnick, culminating an a genuine, honest to goodness Hollywood black-tie award ceremony!

It looks like the competition is still going strong as Connor got similar treatment complete with flights, ceremony and a workshop with professional illustrators.

The great thing about the competition is that it's only open to new talent. If you've already published a novel or (if memory serves) three professionally-paid short stories, then sorry you can't enter. In that way it promotes new writers and illustrators and is still the best venue for finding and promoting new talent.

Anyway, congratulations Connor. I hope this is the start of a long and creative career. And to any other budding writers and illustrators, you can check out the competition at www.writersofthefuture.com/

]]><![CDATA[More SNAFU]]>Sun, 02 Jul 2023 02:59:55 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/more-snafu2285074

It's SNAFU time again and this time it's even more FU than normal.

If you know about these great anthologies from Cohesion Press you know that they're always packed full of action and feature short stories from some of the best names in the business and this next outing is no exception. In fact, the previous books have done so well that they've even caught the eye of Hollywood with several stories being picked up by Blur Studios for their Emmy Award Winning Netflix series Love Death + Robots.

I've been lucky enough to feature in four of the previous books along with a couple of repeats in best-of and charity collections. This time I'm on the cover, and sharing it with none other than such big names as Alan Baxter and James A Moore.

My Story, King Rat, is a cyberpunk tale with a side of body horror in keeping with the 'Punk'd' theme. Here comes the pitch:

A cybernetic mercenary endowed with all the aspects of the Chinese zodiac discovers a link between his own past and his latest quarry: a shared history that offers the chance to right a decades-old wrong. But is there also the chance for something more than just revenge?

If that sounds intriguing, or maybe you want to check out some of the other stories, SNAFU: Punk'd is already available for presale and will be coming out at Halloween.

]]><![CDATA[SALE Time!]]>Mon, 20 Feb 2023 21:38:30 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/sale-timeThe semi-finalists in Hugh Howey's 2nd Annual Self Published Science Fiction Competition (#SPSFC) have got together this week to promote their books.

All books will be 99 cents or less at some point this week. Deals vary, but you can check them all out on The Escapist Book Co. at the link below and maybe find your new favorite author.

My book, The View from Infinity Beach, will be FREE this weekend from 24th to 26th Feb as part of this promotion. I'll send out some reminders when that drops.

Thanks to Drew Melbourne for putting this all together.

]]><![CDATA[A bit quiet isn't it...?]]>Sun, 24 Jul 2022 00:35:33 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/a-bit-quiet-isnt-itHi All... I realize it's been a bit quiet here lately despite quite a lot going on in my writing life at the moment. If you want to keep in touch, I suggest checking out my Facebook page. I will try and keep this website updated, but if history is any guide, I probably won't.

RPL Johnson

]]><![CDATA[Want a free ebook?]]>Wed, 03 Feb 2021 05:47:48 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/want-a-free-ebookYou might have seen me posting about my new science fiction novel The View from Infinity Beach featuring the awesome cover art below by Andrew Dobell at Creative Edge Designs.

It's going live on Amazon in a few weeks but you can get a free copy ahead of time. Just contact me at admin@rpljohnson.com and tell me the best e-mail to send it to and it's yours. The only catch is that I will send you a follow up e-mail asking for a review on Amazon when it launches.

Reviews are really important, especially for indie authors. Amazon works on an algorithm that takes account of the number of reviews. No reviews means the book will never make it to the first page of search results and will never be recommended, and without exposure it will disappear among the hundreds of new books released every month. And of course new readers will consider reviews when making their buying choices so a few good ones would really help me out.

And as well as helping me out, you score a free book. The View from Infinity Beach is a science fiction adventure that follows Kade, a young man from Earth who becomes an unlikely hero in a mining colony's war of independence. It's fast-paced and has got great characters and some epic scenes of destruction but is generally PG13 so would be great for teenagers too. If you like The Expanse on Amazon Prime, you'll probably like this.

Anyway, drop me a PM if you're interested and I'll put you on the list. And don't worry, other than one or two reminders about leaving a review, you won't get spammed by e-mails and won't get added to any other campaigns.

Thanks in Advance
Rich

]]><![CDATA[Update on Infinity Beach]]>Sun, 31 Jan 2021 02:43:52 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/update-on-infinity-beachGetting pretty excited about the next book launch. I've pushed the boat out a bit on this one with custom artwork for the cover and its turned out better than I could have imagined.

I can't share it just yet as we're still working through some final tweaks, but I hope to be able to do a cover reveal pretty soon. After that there will be a chance to get a free advance copy through BookFunnel. But more on that later.

There is no part of this book that I'm not happy with and proud of. I can't wait to get it out there and hopefully into the hands of plenty of new readers.

Watch this space...
]]><![CDATA[The Expanding Universe]]>Thu, 17 Sep 2020 07:23:03 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/the-expanding-universe

The Expanding Universe is out now featuring my story 'Cog'.

Craig Martelle of 20Booksto50K fame has brought together a fantastic collection of sci-fi short stories from some great authors. Whatever your taste, you're bound to find something in here to enjoy.

Craig is a machine when it comes to self-publishing. It was great to have front row seat to watch the book come together and learn a few tricks from an expert.

You can grab a copy in ebook or paperback HERE.

]]><![CDATA[UFOs... For Real?]]>Sun, 03 May 2020 06:15:06 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/ufos-for-realOn 29th April, the Pentagon officially released footage of three unidentified arial phenomena, or what are colloquially known as UFOs. The three short video clips had been previously leaked and already widely reported and show various fuzzy blobs as seen from cameras mounted on military aircraft and taken between 2004 and 2015.

One eye witness, Commander David Fravor, has even appeared on the Joe Rogan podcast and he certainly sounds compelling.

The FLIR video from 2004 shows an oval shape with no visible means of propulsion holding position for about a minute before accelerating out of frame to the left.

The Go Fast video from 2015 shows a smaller object (or a similar object at greater distance) traveling rapidly.

The Gimbal video shows another irregularly oval object holding position and rotating.

These videos and others can be downloaded direct from the website of the US Navy www.navair.navy.mil/foia/documents

So what are these things? Are they evidence of extraterrestrial visitation or something more mundane?

Well, they are not called unidentified flying objects for nothing.

The truth is that we don't know what they are. They are all indistinct due to the distance at which the video was taken so we can't see much except for their overall shape and behavior and the reactions of pilots. And in a way, it is those reactions which are the most interesting parts of the videos. I'm not an expert at interpreting the output from military sensors, but the pilots and their Weapons Systems Operators (or WSOs) are and they can be heard several times during the videos saying, "What the f*** is that?" and other exclamations.

So... what could they be?

First of all, it is extremely unlikely that they are of alien origin... sorry. Everything we know about physics tells us that the speed of light is a natural law throughout the universe. It is a speed limit that cannot be breached not even by light itself. A hundred years ago we had the Wright Flyer and now we have F22s and 747s, but it is not just a case of future, more advanced civilizations getting faster and faster ships until interstellar travel is possible. The speed of light is a natural law that will hamper interstellar travel for any civilization. It's very unlikely that some Tony Stark-like super-genius has developed an advanced arial vehicle in his bedroom, but even that one in a billion chance is more likely than interstellar travel.
Are they weather balloons or pockets of swamp gas or distant lights refracted through a pocket of dense air or any of the usual excuses trotted out to explain these phenomena? I'm going to say no on that one too. It is true that the vast majority of UFO sightings reported by the general public are usually mundane. As a rule people are not used to looking up at the stars, and its easy for non-stargazers to misinterpret lights in teh sky. But these videos are taken by experienced aircrew who are presumably skilled in reading their instruments. Whatever these things are, they are certainly unusual.
In my story, The Waking Dragon available in SNAFU: Black Ops I wrote about the first nation on earth to develop true artificial intelligence leveraging that knowledge to create fantastic new weapons of war.
Now that's pure speculative fiction, but again I'd put it a couple of notches above alien visitation

Could they be products of malfunctioning equipment? Possibly. For example, the object in the FLIR video that appears to accelerate rapidly to the left, could be produced by the camera pod panning rapidly to the right. The azimuth shown on the video indicates that the camera has not moved, but again when put next to the incredibly small possibility of alien visitation, even a rare and confusingly specific malfunction like this is relatively much more likely.
Another possibility is that these are real advanced vehicles, either of US origin or of some other nationality. This is unlikely, but still possible.

The frustrating truth is that, for the moment, these unidentified flying objects must remain just that... unidentified.

]]><![CDATA[How to write a synopsis]]>Sun, 26 Apr 2020 02:56:43 GMThttp://www.rpljohnson.com/blog/how-to-write-a-synopsisThis post came about after a conversation on Reddit. A user had asked how on Earth were they supposed to boil their whole novel down to a short synopsis? It is difficult, that's true. Sometimes as an author you don't want to discard characters and lovingly-crafted sub-plots in order to describe your story to some arbitrary 300 word limit. It's also true that brevity tends to make every story sound fairly generic: A hero struggles against impossible odds to achieve some goal... So what? Stripped of all the little details that make your story unique, what makes your story stand out from a thousand others.

As usual, I'm not saying I have all the answers, but I have gone through this process before and maybe my example will help you out...

Different agents and publishers have different criteria for accepting submissions, so when trying to sell my Young Adult Sci-fi novel, Infinity Beach, I was forced to write synopses as a few different lengths: the one line elevator pitch, a 300 word synopsis and one that was "...one or two pages long".

Hopefully you'll get a sense of what I felt was critical informations and what could be discarded. Maybe that will help you in writing synopses of your own work.

Here goes...

One Line Synopsis (The Elevator Pitch)

A young man from Earth becomes an unlikely hero in a mining colony’s war for independence.

300 Word Synopsis (296 words / 1770 Characters)

Kade Morton is a young man far from home. Although he’s been told that humanity’s future lies in the asteroid belt, Excalibur station looks just as cramped and dirty as the tenements he left behind. He befriends a young hacker called John Turnbull and his rich clients Lawrence Hackett and Lizzie Hopkins. Together they learn of the Kera—a huge, hollow asteroid kept secret from Earth, or so they thought.

During a joyride to the Kera, they uncover a plot to claim the asteroid for Earth. They repel the invaders and become unlikely heroes in the Belt’s war of independence. But Earth is not done with them yet and when Excalibur Station is occupied, Kade and his friends form an underground resistance.

Escalating acts of sabotage by the resistance lead to a military crackdown and Kade rescues Excalibur’s CEO—Lawrence’s mother, Michelle Hackett—from execution.

The revolution begins on two fronts: John and Liz ferment resistance on the station while Kade, Lawrence and Michelle return to the Kera. Using Michelle’s override codes they crash-brake the Kera’s rotation causing a tsunami and devastating the enemy forces stationed there, but Michelle is injured and her spacesuit damaged.

The routed Earth forces flee to their ship and threaten to open fire on Excalibur station. Michelle proposes blowing the end cap off the Kera, firing it like cannon as big as a small country, but she needs Kade to arm the cap’s explosive charges.

Kade is on his way to do this when Lawrence confronts him. Venting the Kera means his mother, with her damaged space suit, is sacrificing herself.

With time running out, Kade overcomes Lawrence and fires the cap. Michelle has sacrificed herself to save the Kera. Kade has routed the Earth forces but earned Lawrence's undying enmity.

1-2 Page Synopsis (787 words)

Kade Morton is a young man far from home. His mother has found work in Earth’s asteroid belt and he is being dragged along against his will. Although he’s been told that the future of the human race lies in space, Excalibur Station looks even more cramped and dirty than the tenements he left behind. Most of the other kids on station grew up in space and play by rules he does not understand.

Kade falls in with John Turnbull, a boy about his own age but very different. John is ferociously intelligent: a hustler and a hacker. John is convinced that Excalibur is hiding something out in the Belt. He uses Kade to ingratiate himself with Lawrence Hackett, son of the station's C.E.O., through the low-gravity sport of Coriol. They learn the secret, but at the cost of a sparking a simmering rivalry between Kade and Lawrence.

The secret project is the Kera, a hollow asteroid many kilometres long that is being developed as a new home in space. The Kera has been kept off the books because the Federation of Nations on Earth is seeking to appropriate all space-based resources.

On the eve of the celebration of Crossover, Lawrence and a group of rich kids including Lizzie Hopkins, enlist Kade and John for a secret jaunt to the empty Kera. Kade is amazed by the secret world inside the asteroid. Suddenly he understands humanity’s future in space.

While the kids are swimming off Infinity Beach--the shore of the Kera's never-ending cylindrical sea--the asteroid is invaded by an advance party of Federation troops. The rich kids are locked up. The soldiers put explosives on the door to deter escape. They free themselves by remotely firing the Kera’s engines, causing a tremor which sets off the explosives, catching the soldiers in the blast.

They flee and Liz fights the remaining soldiers with a mining waldo: a robotic, humanoid bulldozer.

The kids make it back to Excalibur Station, but the invasion is just beginning. With Excalibur occupied, the kids meet secretly inside a video game called Havoc. Using John's hacking ability they disrupt Federation broadcasts. During one attempt at sabotage, they are discovered and Kade is forced to kill in self-defense. This troubles Kadebut John finds he has a taste for chaos.

The conflict escalates and when John kills a whole squad of Federation troops, the Feds react by threatening to execute Michelle Hackett, visionary C.E.O. of Excalibur and Lawrence's mother. The kids rescue her by cutting her cell out of the station’s ring using an asteroid mining ship.

With Michelle safe, the revolution begins. Kade, Lawrence and Michelle head to the Kera while Liz and John remain on the station. John manages to upload weapons onto the station's network of 3D printers but is shot. Liz leads a popular uprising that succeeds in overthrowing the Federation.

On the Kera, Kade, Lawrence and Michelle revisit the idea of pulsing the engines to cause a tremor, but on a massive scale. They crash-brake the spinning Kera and the momentum of the huge internal sea causes a tsunami that devastates the Federation forces stationed there. Michelle is injured and her spacesuit damaged.

The routed Federation forces flee to their ship and threaten to open fire on Excalibur station. The rebels have no navy and seemingly no way of fighting back. Michelle proposes blowing the end cap off the Kera, firing it like cannon as big as a small country, but she needs Kade to arm the cap’s explosive charges.

Kade is on his way to do this when he is confronted by Lawrence. Venting the Kera means his mother, with her damaged space suit, is sacrificing herself. Kade understands that Michelle is making this sacrifice to save the new future she has built for her son, but Lawrence is blinded by his love for his mother.

Kade manages to overcome Lawrence and fire the cap. He and Lawrence are caught at the centre of a kilometres-wide storm as the end cap is blown off like a cannonball and crashes into the Federation ship, destroying it. Michelle has sacrificed herself and Kade has earned Lawrence's undying enmity.

The epilogue shows Kade, one year later, swimming inside the repaired Kera. The air is thin and the water cold, but his is used to it now. After the tsunami and the violent depressurisation, the Kera has some battle scars. So does Kade. The Kera is being upgraded and they are preparing to leave the solar system on a journey that will take centuries. Kade will be the leader of a new generation of explorers and it all started the first time he saw the view from Infinity Beach...

Infinity beach is currently doing the rounds of agents and publishers' open submissions windows. Hopefully it will find a home soon.

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