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Mohrbooks Literary Agency
Sebastian Ritscher
Original language
English
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SECRET IDENTITY

Alex Segura

From Edgar-nominated and Anthony Award-winning writer Alex Segura comes a rollicking literary mystery set in the world of comic books.
It's 1975 and the comic book industry is struggling, but Carmen Valdez doesn't care. She's an assistant at Spectrum Comics, which doesn't have the creative zeal of Marvel nor the buttoned-up efficiency of DC, but it doesn't matter. Carmen is tantalizingly close to fulfilling her dream of writing a superhero book.

That dream is nearly a reality when one of the Spectrum writers enlists her help to create a new character, which they call "The Lethal Lynx," Spectrum's first female hero. But her colleague is acting strangely and asking to keep her involvement a secret. And then he's found dead, with all of their scripts turned into the publisher without her name. Carmen is desperate to piece together what happened to him, to hang on to her piece of the Lynx, which turns out to be a runaway hit. But a surprise visitor from her home in Miami complicates things, a tenacious cop who begins to uncover fragments of the true story a little bit too quickly. Carmen soon finds herself caught in the tangled web of secrets and resentments plaguing the passionate eccentrics who thrive in the underbelly of the comics world.

Alex Segura uses his expertise as a comics creator as well as his unabashed love of noir fiction to create a truly one-of-a-kind novel--hard-edged and bright-eyed, gritty and dangerous, and utterly absorbing.

Alex Segura is the co-president of Archie Comics and the author of Star Wars Poe Dameron: Free Fall and the Pete Fernandez Mystery series. He has also written a number of comic books, most notably the superhero noir The Black Ghost, the YA music series The Archies, and the "Archie Meets" collection of crossovers. A Miami native, he lives in New York City with his wife and children.
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Book

Published 2022-03-15 by Flatiron Books

Comments

Taut, fast-paced and wildly entertaining, Secret Identity merges classic noir with the three-color world of superhero comics in a way that will delight fans of both.

This book was a page-turner in the best ways, but the characters and their lives felt so real that I found myself wishing it would continue even past the mystery. A truly special noir book.

A cleverly-plotted mystery meets the vibrant setting of the 1970s New York comics scene in Secret Identity. Alex Segura's new novel explores the masks people wear in exquisite detail, and I loved everything about it.

Comic books, murder, and that knife of noir that Alex Segura wields like a surgeon. Secret Identity is a new and beautiful exploration of genre, revealing the darkest depths of our true selves. This isn't a book, it's a full, daring experience.