Freedom City

John Ira Thomas, Author, Editor, Publisher

[anulumgygis]

Writing something like TIRE either creates ripples in the universe or narrows your focus so you notice new things. But since this started in 2024 and they made the “the” part of the official title, my guess is someone thinks they found defunct IP to exploit.

Home - The Tire Magazine

Since they’re content to only write about tires, I figure meh and enjoy what the fires of my creation have wrought.

They post about once a week, which makes me more curious. There are no bylines and it reads like AI slop fueled by press releases.

[anulumgygis]

It’s been a big year for Candle Light Press, our thirtieth! I’m currently putting finishing touches on Zoo Force: The Works, a collection of all four ZF volumes, complete with the original puzzles and coloring pages.

We had to omit the fun pages for our We Heart Libraries volume. We’d tried getting the ALA to review the individual ZF volumes and they wouldn’t. I paid a visit to the Chicago office and they told me it’s ALA policy not to review books that invite patrons to write in them. That’s fair.

So the We Heart Libraries edition was born. It got a nice review in Booklist.

But now we’re assembling a new volume, including the brand new Blue Route and Stops Along the Way (new this year!). The Works will also have new coloring and puzzles, an annotated cover gallery, a word or two from C. Cat, and essays by me, Jeremy, and Carter.

I’m also knee-deep in writing The Best of TIRE Classifieds, a 100% new book pretending not to be. It’ll be like all the great cash grab paperbacks of the 70s. It’ll also feature art by more artists than ever before! My original goal was 1000 ads and no art. Now it’s 500 with art.

I treat Tire projects like my own personal production Ironman contest. Each one is a test for me.

I’m also taking another swipe at a Man Is Vox 3 script. I’ve done a couple full scripts over the years and neither landed right. Carter and I have a framework now and we think this one’s gonna go the distance.

I’m also teaching a course on comics at the University of Iowa this Fall. It’s called Building Comics. It’ll focus on learning all the jobs involved in making a comic. It’s for creators and readers alike.

I’m also lettering the second issue of Polenas, a new book I wrote for Will Beard.

This year is absolutely insane, and there’s more to come!

[candlelightpress]

Plato lied to us... for our own good.

It was Karapace that laid Atlantis low in a single day. He is the “King of the Kaiju,” and he is coming for Coastal City, Oregon.

All that stands between Karapace and oblivion for this city are two organizations, centuries-old sworn enemies – the Big Spirits and Immortal Tomorrow. Which one is really prepared to take on this monster of monsters? Which one is ready for The Wrath of Karapace?

From Carter Allen, the creator of “Ectyron”, and Leroy Douresseaux,the editor of “Time is Squared”, comes the next big thing in kaiju-themed action.

$16.95, available now wherever books are sold.

[anulumgygis]

I did the lettering and production for this fine book. Get it wherever you get books!

[anulumgygis]

It’s the new TIRE, fourteen years ahead of schedule! TIRE MAY 2038 is loose in the world!

What are the cues we use to determine humanity? Have we been cutting actual humans too much slack in this department? This work explores notions of identity and AI, but is solely the work of humans. For what is the difference between a human seeking a scripted outcome and a script seeking a human outcome? Also, it's pretty funny.

John Ira Thomas takes his metafictional TIRE series into the future and looks back at the same weird beliefs that continue to propel us. It's 2038 and John Ira Thomas is nowhere to be found. A new, legally-mandated issue of TIRE magazine must be written.

Corley Tire Company decides to farm the project out to AntiJITBot, an AI programmed with all of Thomas' writings. The result is an entire issue of a New Age magazine, right down to the classified ads.

Once again, this was written by actual humans. No mystery digits or nightmare palettes. It's just some good old-fashioned human fun with technological concepts that we're going to have to resolve.

172 pages in color, $24.95 wherever you buy your books.

[anulumgygis]

Welcome to the new digs. I’ve created a new tumblr as part of a consolidation of my media presence. I’ll be adding things here and there and posting more often. The old Freedom City tumblr will remain active at johnirathomas.tumblr.com, but johnirathomas.com will point here. I’ll keep you up to date on exciting projects like, well…

There’s this handsome devil, out just before Thanksgiving, 2023. It’s the first in the Candle Light Press Classical line. Kulseth and Larmour draw a line connecting modern Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and ancient pankration fighting. It may be the first such book written by at least one person who’s been in a proper fight or three. I served as editor and saw this work through production. It’s an incredibly interesting work and I hope you’ll check it out.

Here’s their blurb:

What has Brazilian Jiu Jitsu to do with the Ancient Greeks? A lot, according to Joshua Kulseth and David Larmour, investigating the connections between the Greek pankration and contemporary BJJ and MMA. They argue that today's Brazilian Jiu Jitsu gyms, training, and competitions offer the closest modern analogy to Ancient Greek wrestlers and pankratiasts and to the ideals of Greek agonism embodied in the Olympic Games.

Their book, Agony: Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and the Greeks combines Kulseth's first-person narrative of experience in combat sports with Larmour's expertise in ancient Greek athletics, literature and mythology, and is illustrated by original artwork by Jeremy Smith.

When we struggle today for self-improvement or victory in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts, the ancient Greeks walk among us-not only the ordinary citizens of Athens or Sparta doing their daily training in the local palaestra, but also famous athletes like Milo and Arrichion, heroes of myth like Odysseus and Heracles, poets like Pindar and Sophocles, and even gods like Zeus and Prometheus.

The ISBN is 978-0989537155 and is available or orderable anywhere books are sold.

[anulumgygis]

Welcome to the new digs. I’ve created a new tumblr as part of a consolidation of my media presence. I’ll be adding things here and there and posting more often. The old Freedom City tumblr will remain active at johnirathomas.tumblr.com, but johnirathomas.com will point here. I’ll keep you up to date on exciting projects like, well…

There’s this handsome devil, out just before Thanksgiving, 2023. It’s the first in the Candle Light Press Classical line. Kulseth and Larmour draw a line connecting modern Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and ancient pankration fighting. It may be the first such book written by at least one person who’s been in a proper fight or three. I served as editor and saw this work through production. It’s an incredibly interesting work and I hope you’ll check it out.

Here’s their blurb:

What has Brazilian Jiu Jitsu to do with the Ancient Greeks? A lot, according to Joshua Kulseth and David Larmour, investigating the connections between the Greek pankration and contemporary BJJ and MMA. They argue that today's Brazilian Jiu Jitsu gyms, training, and competitions offer the closest modern analogy to Ancient Greek wrestlers and pankratiasts and to the ideals of Greek agonism embodied in the Olympic Games.

Their book, Agony: Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and the Greeks combines Kulseth's first-person narrative of experience in combat sports with Larmour's expertise in ancient Greek athletics, literature and mythology, and is illustrated by original artwork by Jeremy Smith.

When we struggle today for self-improvement or victory in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts, the ancient Greeks walk among us-not only the ordinary citizens of Athens or Sparta doing their daily training in the local palaestra, but also famous athletes like Milo and Arrichion, heroes of myth like Odysseus and Heracles, poets like Pindar and Sophocles, and even gods like Zeus and Prometheus.

The ISBN is 978-0989537155 and is available or orderable anywhere books are sold.