It might be a trope, but crime novelist Alex Segura is pretty mild-mannered. Behind his Clark Kentish super kindness is a hard-working writer trying to bring zap! and pow! to crime fiction while also giving voice to underrepresented characters in the world he grew up in: comic books.
Segura worked in the comics trade for years and, side-hustle style, wrote and published a series of private investigator novels before deciding to cross the streams. In 2021, he married his love of crime fiction with his expertise in comics into Secret Identity—a book that won wide acclaim and awards attention.
Segura has written in the Star Wars universe (Poe Dameron: Free Fall), the Spider-Verse (the YA superhero adventure Araña/Spider-Man 2099: Dark Tomorrow), and the Disney-Verse—giving us the backstory on why we can’t talk about Bruno (no no no) in Encanto: Nightmares and Sueños. He is also the author, with Rob Hart, of the sci-fi/espionage thriller Dark Space and the writer on a number of comic books featuring Marvel heroes the Avengers, Sunspot, White Tiger, Spider-Man and DC’s Superman, Sinestro, and The Question, to name a few.
In his latest novel, Alter Ego, the secret identity of Secret Identity gets the recognition and the legacy she deserves. As a kid, Annie Bustamante discovered comics through an old tattered copy of The Legendary Lynx. She became an artist, then a filmmaker. Annie’s film career has stalled out when she gets the chance to take on drawing The Lynx herself. She snaps up the chance to regroup, provide for her daughter—and maybe once and for all unveil the creator who lurks behind the Lynx’s mask. But getting to live out her creative dream doesn’t come without trade-offs—or danger.
Writing about creativity as a source of joy, as Elizabeth Gilbert says in her book Big Magic, is “a gangster move.” For fans of intrigue and of comic books that do more than “fights and tights,” Alter Ego is a story about identity, art, representation, and when art and commerce come to blows.
I talked to Alex Segura via email about his origin story, his super power, and writing a sequel that stands on its own.
The interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Lori Rader-Day
Alex, for those who might not be familiar with your work—what’s your origin story?
Alex Segura
Well, I’ve always been a reader of comics and stories. I loved Agatha Christie and Sherlock Holmes as a kid, and was consuming those stories alongside issues of Spider-Man and Archie. At a young age I was writing my own stories with those characters and my own. I’m from Miami, originally, the son of Cuban immigrants, and I grew up there. Around 2013, after working as a journalist and PR/marketing person in the comic book industry, I published my first novel, Silent City, the first in the Pete Fernandez Quintet of Miami mysteries. At the same time, I’ve written a ton of comics, for places like Marvel, DC, Archie, Dark Horse, ComiXology, and more. My last crime novel, Secret Identity, won the LA Times Book Prize in Mystery/Thriller, and I’ve also written novels in the Star Wars, Spider-Verse, and Encanto universes for YA and MG readers! Whew.
Lori Rader-Day
Whew is right! Was writing something you always wanted to do?
Alex Segura
Yeah, I mean, even before I knew it was writing, I was doing it. Like drawing and creating a new character to hang out with Archie and the gang, or writing my own X-Men fanfiction. I always had a desire to either add to the mythologies I was a fan of, or create my own. In college, I was a journalist, but also an English major, and it was around that time that I realized I could use the skills I’d learned working overtime at the college paper (to the detriment of my studies, if we’re being honest) to create stories. But it took a while for that to become an actual career path.
Lori Rader-Day
Your latest novel, Alter Ego, is a sequel to the award-winning Secret Identity. Secret Identity features a protagonist, Carmen Valdez, who breaks into comics in the 1970s as a woman creator, not without some trouble. In Alter Ego, we have the protagonist Annie Bustamante, who is deep into a successful career as a woman creator. Where do these women intersect? What do they have in common?
Alex Segura
I like writing about powerful, driven women because in my life, I’ve been surrounded by them, and I want to read stories about them. There are already plenty of novels starring square-jawed, older white men. I’m really drawn to stories with diverse heroes, whether it’s gender or identity or sexuality or lifestyle. Carmen and Annie are both passionate, but we’re meeting them at very different points in their careers. In Secret Identity, Carmen is just starting out, unsure of her skills or path creatively. With Alter Ego, Annie is more established—in two mediums, comics and film—and confident. Annie is also a parent, which goes back to my bigger point, that we all benefit from stories starring heroes we don’t see often. I found writing a parent more challenging because you have to be mindful of their other, non-“work” responsibilities and so on, but it also resulted in a more textured book.
Back to Annie and Carmen… Neither suffer fools gladly, but Annie approaches the story with a bit more fearlessness than Carmen, which made her more challenging to write. I don’t want to spoil anything, but Carmen is felt on every page of Alter Ego, even if she’s not an active character for most of the novel. I think her echo is loud, and Annie is very much driven to find out the truth because of Carmen’s influence on her own life, so the book is in some ways a long conversation between the two of them about art, life, and fighting for yourself.
Lori Rader-Day
Can you talk a bit about the inspiration for these books, and why you wanted to continue this story beyond the first novel?
Alex Segura
I lay the credit (and the blame, when I was struggling with the book) on the lap of my amazing editor, Zack Wagman at Flatiron, who very smartly realized that we needed another beat at the end of Secret Identity, letting readers know how Carmen’s story ended up. I wrote the epilogue that’s now in the novel, and it got us both to thinking that there might be another story here, as Zack calls it, “the other side of the coin.” A tale of art versus commerce in the modern day, through the eyes of a fan of the Lynx who not only uncovers the truth behind Carmen’s role in creating the character [in Secret Identity], but has to deal with someone’s desperate urge to prevent that secret from coming out.
But sequels are hard! I very much wanted this book to feel both essential and standalone. If people read both books and the graphic novel, they will hopefully get a more textured look at this world, but I also tried to be mindful to have Alter Ego be its own thing, have its own flavor and tone, and also be able to exist on its own. I tried to look at my favorite sequels across media and what I concluded was the best sequels are, obviously, just great on their own, and augment the previous work without overshadowing it or trying to replace it. So, Alter Ego is very much its own thing, but if read together with Secret Identity and [the comic book] The Legendary Lynx, is part of a greater whole.
Lori Rader-Day
What writers do you point to as influences?
Alex Segura
Oh, so many. But off the top of my head right now: Margaret Millar, Laura Lippman, Megan Abbott, Stephen King, George Pelecanos, Dennis Lehane, James Ellroy, Walter Mosley, Leonardo Padura, Carolina Garcia-Aguilera, Greg Rucka, JM DeMatteis, and Ross Macdonald.
Lori Rader-Day
Are you reading/watching/experiencing anything cool these days?
Alex Segura
One of the downsides, I guess, of being busy is I don’t really have a ton of time to watch movies or TV shows unless I convince myself there’s some “work reason” to watch, so I’ve been revisiting “The Mandalorian” and “Andor” lately. I also spent a lot of time watching political thrillers in relation to my next crime novel—so movies like The Torture Report, The Parallax View, The Firm…those have been entertaining. Books-wise, I really loved Our Wives Under the Sea by Juliar Armfield, Carrie Carolyn Coco by Sarah Gerard, The Name of this Band is R.E.M. by Peter Ames Carlin, The Guest by Emma Cline, Great Expectations by Vinson Cunningham, Doppelganger by Naomi Klein, and a lot of comics.
Lori Rader-Day
Of course comics! Is there one bit of advice you’d share with people looking to get published? Any major lessons learned?
Alex Segura
These are the tidbits I share with new writers when I get questions like this, and I hope they help people in the same way they helped me:
Finish something. A short story, a script, a scene. Finish it. Type THE END. Then reread it, revise it, make it better. Then put it away and start something else. Before too long, you’ve got a few things you can share or shop around. Don’t make that epic, twelve-part fantasy saga the first thing you jump into, because you will get lost at sea.
Treat it like a job. It’s a twist on the “dress for the job you want” cliche, and better, I think. If you want to write professionally, treat it like something more than a hobby. Put in the work. Read books that inspire you (not necessarily books about writing, but do read!), engage in the writing community by going to events and networking and making friends, and support other writers. I’m blessed that writing is my job but it’s also a lot of work, and it started long before I was published. I first put pen to paper on Silent City in 2008, and the first short story that helped spring me to write Secret Identity came together when I was in college. Be kind, be professional, and be human.
Celebrate the wins but also expect rejection. For every 20 pitches you send, you’re bound to get 19 rejections. It’s just the name of the game, whether it’s agents, short story magazines, publishers, whatever. You need to brace for that, and also be able to celebrate the wins that do come because you put in the work. I try to not get too high or too low, because publishing is a topsy-turvy business and you’re one good email away from your life changing completely.
Lori Rader-Day
What are you working on next?
Alex Segura
My next novel, a Marvel Crime story starring Daredevil titled Enemy of My Enemy, hits next year from Marvel—so I’m feverishly writing that!
Lori Rader-Day
Follow-up question! Which super power would you love to have? Which super power do you actually have?
Alex Segura
I’d love to have superspeed! I could do even more work!
As for what my superpower is…I don’t know, I try to be understanding. Is that a power? I try to stay humble and be helpful to others that are doing this writing thing. It can be very hard and solitary, so it feels good when you have the brain space to give back.
FICTION
Alter Ego
by Alex Segura
Flatiron Books
Published on December 3, 2024
