Lie Machine

Lie Machine

What is this?

Lie Machine is a non-fiction anthology about propaganda, bad faith arguments, headline-twisting narratives, and biased reportage, both in the past and present . . . and perhaps, potentially, even the future.

Remember the woman who sued McDonald’s over too-hot coffee, and then had her perfectly justified lawsuit condemned as absurd and greedy by the popular press? Did you know drug prohibition legislation in the US was pushed through on a wave of racist fear-mongering? Or are you watching Grok spread Holocaust denialism in real time, and wanna talk about what that might mean for the future?

Yeah, we want stories like that. And we want those stories from you.

Who’s involved?

Check out our line-up of prominent co-conspirators:

What we want

Lie Machine will be a black-and-white, all-comic anthology. Each submission should be between 4 and 20 pages in length. The please consider proposing stories about:

  • Corporations using PR to hide wrongdoing, like tobacco manufacturers buying the beneficial testimony of doctors before Congress.
  • Mass media being used to launder the public image of organizations, like an examination of the close ties between Hollywood and the US Armed Forces.
  • Quotes being used out of context to push the opposite message that was intended, like when bigots attempt to lecture activists by quoting Martin Luther King.
  • Government censorship being used to rewrite history, like when the Nazi youth brigades burned the pioneering gender research of the Institute for Sexual Science.

…But don’t limit yourself to just these subjects! Lie Machine submissions should cover the length and breadth of manipulation via media, from newsrooms to Facebook groups, botfarms to thinktanks, Grokipedia to genAI. Submit a story about the Replication Crisis, or Creationist museums, or Lamarckian inheritance! If it’s your idea of a lie machine, we want to hear you talk about it!

What we don’t want

  • Submissions from creators under the age of 18.
  • Pin-ups and prose submissions. This anthology will exclusively feature comics.
  • Excessively graphic content. Submissions to the anthology must be equivalent to a PG-13 or soft R movie rating. No frequent “hard” profanity or erotica will be accepted.
  • Proposals from incomplete creative teams. If you’re an artist without a writer, or a writer without an artist, please find a partner before submitting your proposal. Iron Circus Comics can’t play matchmaker. (Single-creator submissions are fine. We don’t prefer multi-person teams over single creators, or vice-versa.)
  • Fanfic, fan art, or pastiche. Please don’t submit stories using intellectual property you don’t own, or stories that are clearly referential of such work / take place in the same universe or reality.
  • Conspiracy theories. Submissions about how pseudoscience and conspiratorial thinking operate are fine; submissions proposing that conspiracy theories such as Atlantis or Area 51 have merit are not.
  • Fiction/parody. This is a non-fiction anthology. We don’t want fictional stories, or parodies of existing propaganda presented sincerely.

Payment

Lie Machine will pay contributing teams a page rate of $70, plus ten contributor’s copies per creator, and the perpetual right to buy copies of the anthology for 50% off the cover price for as long as the comic is in print. There will also be a bonus to page rates for all contributors if the Kickstarter campaign meets stretch goals. After the first print run is sold out, the teams will each get $200 every time the book is reprinted.

Creators’ Rights

Creators submit stories to Lie Machine with the understanding that, if accepted, they are ceding exclusive first worldwide rights to the story for a full calendar year from the date of publication, and non-exclusive worldwide reprint rights in perpetuity. Intellectual property rights will remain in the hands of the creator.

We don’t want your characters or concepts, just your comics.

Production

  • Submissions are opening December 1st, 2025.
  • Submissions close February 1st, 2026.
  • Successful applicants will be announced March 1st, 2026.
  • Final art will be due September 15, 2026.
  • Book is scheduled to ship Fall 2027.

If your submission is accepted, the final art must be designed to fit standard American graphic novel dimensions: 6.625″ × 10.25″. What this means for your production process depends on your choice of medium, but the following guides may be useful.

For more information, consult Blambot’s page on the subject.

FAQ

What material will we need to submit for consideration?

Submissions will open December 1st, 2025. Prospective participants will be required to provide:

  • The names and email addresses of all creators involved in the story
  • The title of the proposed story
  • A summary of the proposed story, which includes the beginning, the middle, and the end
  • A predicted page count (estimates are fine)
  • Portfolio links for the proposed participants, which may also include any preparatory sketches done for the proposal, although this is not required

Each participant will also acknowledge and agree to a release, which will be part of the Google form.

What level of ability will you be looking for in submissions?

This is a professional publishing project. Writing and art will have to meet our standards of quality. Please browse our previous anthology efforts to get an idea of what we consider acceptable.

I’m not American. Can I still submit to this anthology? Can I submit a story that doesn’t concern American politics or history?

Sure!

Can I submit more than one proposal? I have multiple good ideas!

Yes, but please, no more than three per creator/creative team. We want your best ideas, not every idea you have.

I have an already-finished comic that fits this prompt perfectly. Would you be willing to consider it?

Only so long as it truly fits the original prompt, follows the stated guidelines, and has never been physically published before. (Online publication as a webcomic or portfolio piece is fine.)

What age group will this anthology be meant for?

YA (Young Adult) and up. And use of “hard” swears (F***, C***) should be limited, and any nudity should be non-sexual.

Is the page rate per comic, or per team member?

Per comic. If the anthology finishes its crowdfund with a $100 page rate, that page rate will be universal, regardless of the size of the creative teams. A comic with three contributing creators won’t make $300 per page.

What about intellectual property rights? Are you buying those from selected stories?

No. Participation in Lie Machine cedes universal first publication rights to Iron Circus for a period of one year, and general publication rights in perpetuity.

What that means in practice is that only ICC and no one else will be permitted to sell your story in the agreed format (as part of an anthology) for one calendar year, and will be permitted to continue to sell your story in that format until the heat death of the universe, non-exclusively. After that initial year concludes, you can put your submission on your own site, sell it to a different anthology, stick it up on itch.io with pay-what-you-want pricing, print it as a mini for cons, anything you like.

And ICC is not purchasing intellectual property rights. If Guillermo del Toro decides he needs to make a movie out of a story we’ve published in Lie Machine, he’ll have to go to you, not us. ICC exclusively publishes creator-owned comics.

Contact Us

If you have any questions about this project which have not been addressed here, you can contact the coordinators at [email protected]. Please read this page in its entirety before emailing.