Breaking News: STAR WARS: THE BATTLE OF JAKKU is coming!

Plus: SDCC, ALTER EGO praise, what I'm reading, and two new comics this week!

Hi friends, happy Monday!

I’ll spare you the “did I miss anything over the weekend?”-style jokes and dive right into the big, breaking news that just hit on StarWars.com with this jaw-dropping Rod Reis teaser image:

Here are the basics on what Star Wars: Battle of Jakku - Insurgency Rises IS:

BATTLE OF JAKKU is a maxi-series written by me, with art by legends Leonard Kirk, Stefano Raffaele, and Jethro Morales, picking up on the events from Star Wars and Darth Vader #50 - jumping past the events of Return of the Jedi to showcase the final, epic battle of the Galactic Civil War. I cannot say a lot about this yet, but it’s been an absolute thrill to explore this period of time in the Star Wars story and to elevate a fun new villain, especially when paired with such amazing artistic collaborators. Here’s the official description!

STAR WARS: BATTLE OF JAKKU — INSURGENCY RISING #1

Written by ALEX SEGURA

Penciled by LEONARD KIRK & STEFANO RAFFAELE

Cover by PHIL NOTO

IN THE WAKE OF THE BATTLE OF ENDOR, CAN LUKE, LEIA AND THE NASCENT NEW REPUBLIC STAVE OFF AN UNEXPECTED — AND DEADLY — NEW THREAT?

A DEFIANT IMPERIAL takes center stage — and goes on the offensive against the NEW REPUBLIC! LEIA makes a startling discovery in the forests of ENDOR! Who are the mysterious and deadly ACOLYTES OF THE BEYOND?! What is the new villain’s connection to DARTH VADER? All this as the post-Return of the Jedi storytelling BEGINS!

This isn’t my first Star Wars adventure, of course - I wrote a Poe Dameron novel, a Qui-Gon short, and a Rebellion one-shot - but it IS by far the biggest in scope, featuring all the key players from a very important period in time. Thankful to my editors, Mark Paniccia, Danny Khazem, and Mikey Basso for the opportunity, to the wonderful folks at LucasFilm (especially Michael Siglain!), and the many authors who’ve done stellar work in this space before I showed up. To say I’ve spent a lot of time reading Chuck Wendig’s trilogy would be aun understatement, not to mention the work of folks like Beth Revis and Alexander Freed, and longtime Star Wars writer (and friend!) Charles Soule. But I’ll talk more about that as we get closer!

Here’s the first cover from the king himself, Phil Noto!

For more details, including some more awesome SDCC news items, read the full story at StarWars.com!

SAN DIEGO COMIC CON

Speaking of, let’s talk a bit about one of the biggest pop culture events of the year, which is happening this week: SAN DIEGO COMIC CON.

I will be there!

I haven’t been to SDCC since before the pandemic, but prior to that, I went almost every year, usually anchored to a booth or panel room for DC or Archie. This will be my first year attending as a full-time freelancer, which feels surreal and exciting at the same time. If you see me on the convention floor, say hi! If you see me wandering the Gaslamp trying to find a vegan burrito, say hi! If you want a specific way to find me, here’s my panel and signing schedule, so you can say hi!

The folks at Mad Cave will have an exclusive SDCC Dick Tracy #1 variant for sale at their booth, which I’m happy to sign. Check out the Tess Truehart amazing cover by the legendary Francesco Francavilla:

And if you’d told me, years ago, that a character I created (The Legendary Lynx!) would be in a promo image with Dick Tracy, a series I was co-writing, I wouldn’t have believed you!

I’ll also be at The Eisner Awards (for the first time in forever) and bopping around, so, again, say hi! Happy to chat about anything and sign whatever you’ve got.

PRAISE FOR ALTER EGO (Dec. 3)

If you’ve ever written a novel, you know the process of getting blurbs for your book is painful and stressful - you’re asking people to take time out of their busy schedules to read your book and write something impactful and effusive. As an author, you want the blurbs to reflect what readers should take away from the novel - if these authors dig the book, their readers will, too. That’s the hope anyway.

For Alter Ego, I wanted readers to hear from authors I admire that could endorse the idea behind the novel - which is a follow-up to my acclaimed and bestselling comic book noir, Secret Identity, but also very much its own thing. Alter Ego aspires to be a modern Hitchcockian thriller that happens to be set in the comic book industry. I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to support that idea. I’ll be rolling out the author quotes over the next few months, but here are two that are very special for different reasons:

I’d be remiss if I didn’t share the full, amazing blurb -

"No one is writing books as unique and riveting as Alex Segura. Alter Ego is a smart, fantastic ride through a mysterious world you may not know but will feel totally comfortable in thanks to Segura’s creative genius. It pulls you in and keeps you turning pages."

First off, I’m thankful that someone as busy as Michael Connelly - a blockbuster author, showrunner, and supremely nice guy - found the time to read this book. MY book. It’s wild. When this came across my inbox, I had to sit back and question if I was dreaming. But it goes a lot deeper than that. Back in 2006 or so, when I’d first moved to New York to work for DC Comics Publicity, I’d started reading mystery novels. I’ve told this story before, but up until that point, comics had been a hobby or a side gig (though I did work at Wizard Magazine full-time, it still felt a little detached from reality), and now it was a job. At DC, you’d get a stack of new comics every week. We had to read them just to know what was coming and to be well-versed in what we were publishing. It didn’t diminish the joy of comics, but the hobby was now a gig - so I found another hobby: crime novels with flawed protagonists that were steeped in setting and tone. Books like George Pelecanos’s DC/Nick Stefanos books,

Laura Lippman

’s wonderful Baltimore/Tess Monaghan series, Dennis Lehane’s Boston-based Pat and Angie novels - and Harry Bosch’s Los Angeles. I have vivid memories of lugging these massive, three-in-one hardcover collections that contained the first nine Bosch books around with me, weighing down my already-stuffed backpack as I explored New York City. I was hooked, and in those days before e-readers were as common as they are today, I couldn’t risk finishing a book on the train and not being able to dive right into the next one. That’s how propulsive the Bosch books were - and how educational. I learned (and continue to learn) a lot from Michael Connelly - about creating compelling backstories for your complicated characters, but not weighing the readers down with too much exposition. About reflecting setting in organic and interesting ways. About giving readers a peek into a world they might not understand, but are probably interested in. Most importantly? About making readers care about your characters by trying really hard to make those characters feel real - not just with tics and foibles, but with relatable flaws and believable desires. Bosch loved jazz, had a dark past, and was gruff but loveable. He felt real. I think about Connelly’s books often - and continue to read his work, because boy is he prolific - but those first nine novels will always hold a special place for me - like that graduate-level course you took decades ago that still rings in your brain. So, yeah - needless to say, this blurb had me over the moon.

But there’s more!

Again, here’s the full blurb, because it’s so great:

"Alex Segura knows how to write a propulsive mystery that hooks you from chapter one. Most of all, I loved Segura's deep and compassionate portrayal of Annie Bustamante, a reluctant heroine I wholeheartedly rooted for until the very end. Alter Ego is a must-read." 

Zoraida Cordova is an author I came to know after I was already “in the biz,” and we first connected directly during the early days of the pandemic on a Star Wars novel panel - my first, and one of those early video panels where glitches were common and everyone was clearly on edge about everything going on with the world. Not too dissimilar to today, minus the glitches. We’ve at least gotten the hang of a Zoom. Anyway, at this point, Zoraida was already a seasoned pro - not only at Star Wars, but publishing in general. What I love about her work - and her entire career - is how varied her output is. She’s the goal: prolific, consistently great, and just wonderful in person. I still remember her advice before the panel. To just relax and have fun. That we were all nerds up there. It was very true. Zoraida isn’t just the kind of author that can hop from genre to genre and make it look seamless, she supports other writers with care and affection. It’s something to aspire to, for sure. Honored to have both their endorsements for Alter Ego, which hits December 3 from Flatiron Books!

OUT THIS WEEK

It’s a busy week for me in comic shops, with two major releases hitting on Wednesday! Swing by your local and pick these up if you can!

BRAVE AND THE BOLD #15 - I join writer pals Tim Seeley, Joshua Hale Fialkov, and Mark Russell with a tale of Renee Montoya, as she struggles against an unseen foe that seems to be targetting not only Commissioner Montoya, but the Question as well. I had a blast penning this three-parter with artist (and old pal) Andy MacDonald - who absolutely killed it on art. If you like your Question stories dripping with noir and mystery, don’t miss this one. Kind of wild that I get to write my favorite DC character ever, and I hope this story does her justice.

DICK TRACY #3 - The gang war tearing the city apart comes into focus as we learn more about the two dueling sides, and about Dick Tracy’s own haunted past. Things amp up as we hit the mid-point of the first arc of this ONGOING series. So proud of the work the team is pouring into this crime saga, especially artist Geraldo Borges, who is just leveling up so hard with this book.

UPCOMING RELEASES

DICK TRACY #3 (Mad Cave) - June 24

BATMAN: THE BRAVE & THE BOLD #15 (DC) - July 24

SPIDER-SOCIETY #1 of 4 (Marvel) - August 14

BATMAN: THE BRAVE & THE BOLD #16 (DC) - August 27

SPIDER-MAN: STORIES FROM THE SPIDER-VERSE (Disney Books) - October 1

STAR WARS: THE BATTLE OF JAKKU - INSURGENCY RISING #1 (Marvel) - October 2

DARK SPACE (Blackstone Publishing) - October 8

ALTER EGO (Flatiron Books) - December 3

ENCANTO: NIGHTMARES & SUEÑOS (Disney Books) - December 3

A QUICK NOTE ON THE DUSK

The folks at Ominous Press tell me they should be done mailing out stuff to backers this week (update coming) - if you haven’t gotten your stuff, please contact them or respond to this email and I will do my best to get it resolved! Thanks for your patience!

WHAT I’M READING

Novels: Great Expectations by Vinson Cunningham, Fight Me by Austin Grossman, Vantage Point by Sarah Sligar, We Are Watching by Alison Gaylin, The Spice Must Flow by Ryan Britt, In Any Lifetime by Marc Guggenheim - all great! And lots of Star Wars books for research, of course.

Comics: Lots of Silver and Bronze Age Legion of Super-Heroes (the kids love the Silver Age stuff, I’m fascinated by the wild early Bronze Age stuff), some early Harbinger (Valiant), Zatanna: Bring Down the House #1 by Tamaki and Rodriguez, Paranoid Gardens #1 by Gerard Way, Shaun Simon, and Chris Weston, Kieron Gillen and Esad Ribic’s Eternals, the new “From the Ashes” X-Men relaunch books, James Robinson and Alan Moore’s underrated runs on WildC.A.T.S. most often with Travis Charest on art, and Ann Nocenti’s wonderful Daredevil run for research.

PODCAST BOUNTY

I totally missed posting about this in my last few missives, but I was blessed to be a guest on three of my favorite podcasts, all within days of each other! After a three-year break, I returned to Cerebro, the must-listen X-Men pod from my dear friend Connor Goldsmith. We focused on Risqué, the femme fatale mutant who appeared most notably in the pages of X-Force in the 90s and recently had a bit of a rebirth (literally and figuratively) in Al Ewing and Valerio Schitti’s SWORD. I remember being very intrigued by the character as a young reader, so it was fun to go back and revisit her story - even if I panicked mid-reread, worried we might not have enough to talk about. Chatting with Connor is always a treat, and being a guest on your favorite podcast is always surreal and fun. Thanks to the Zalagang for being so welcoming. I was also on Chad Anderson’s wonderful Greymalkin Lane with pal and amazing artist Scott Koblish, and I got to gush about Jaime Hernandez’s masterpiece, The Love Bunglers, and Love & Rockets in general with the fantastic Sara Century on her Best Issue Ever podcast! If you want to hear my voice in your head for hours, grab these episodes!

That’s…a lot! And that’s all!

See you soon!

Best,

Alex