by Aric Davis
A poster advertising a concert featuring a long-silent band accidentally reveals to best friends Betty and June some stunning news: the aunt June never knew she had was murdered 15 years ago.
The fund-raising concert is supposed to help free Duke, the man convicted of Mandy Reasoner’s gruesome death. Heroin addicts and prostitutes, Duke and Mandy lived in a squat frequented by a string of nameless homeless people. Duke himself was strung out on heroin when he confessed to killing Mandy. With a confessed killer in the bag, the police believed their work was done.
For June’s mother Claire (the late Mandy’s sister), the attempt to free Duke is a nightmare. June has an uncanny resemblance to her aunt Mandy. If Duke is freed, will June be safe? But if Duke is innocent, where is Mandy’s killer?
Seeking to protect her daughter, Claire enlists the aid of Nickel, an edgy, charismatic teen who’s lived too much violence and tragedy for his age. But how to even begin when June is on the verge of knowing about her aunt’s sordid life and all clues and leads are 15 years old?
Betty and June meanwhile decide investigating Mandy’s murder and Duke’s arrest would make a far, far better research paper than the historical subjects they originally selected.
The story is told in chapters with alternating points of view, which effectively supplies information to the story that the primary characters, Nickel, Betty and June, could not otherwise have had access to.
The characters in Tunnel Vision repeatedly focus tightly on their own questions and answers, losing sight of the dangers standing beside them.
Davis manages to create a fascinating character in Nickel, whose code of honor, warrior’s wits and cunning still works with his inexperience with trust and relationship. Nickel is definitely a character you want to know more about. He first appeared in Davis’ book, Nickel-Plated. It is helpful to have read the first book, Nickel Plated, before reading Tunnel Vision to better understand Nickel’s past and circumstances.
The Author: Aric Davis
Davis has feet on the street experience with his characters and their contexts. He was a body piercer for 17 years before trading needles for pen and writing full time. Born in Ithaca, New York, he lived most of his life in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He, like Betty and June, is a lover of punk rock.Davis’ other books include:
- Nickel Plated (2011). At 12, Nickel has been through the foster care wringer. A good dad for a few years gave him skills and a code of honor. Escaped from the foster care system, he earns money selling marijuana to teens, blackmailing pedophiles he locates online and doing private investigations. When a beautiful girl named Arrow hires him to find her little sister Shelby, he finds an ugly universe in the suburbs that puts children up for sale to adults with hearts of evil.
- A Good and Useful Hurt (2012). Tattoo artist Mike hires piercing artist Deb to join the motley crew at his shop. An unexpected romance makes them a pair and then a vengeful duo when a serial killed tragically intersects with the lives of those at the tattoo shop.
- The Fort (2013). In the last days of summer 1987, a deranged Vietnam veteran stalks Grand Rapids, abducting and murdering victims from the street. When three boys sitting in a treehouse fort spot the man holding a gun to the back of 16-year-old Molly they go to the police. When the police ignore their story, they set out to put a stop to the evil in their midst.
- Rough Men (2013). Will Daniels has turned away from a shady past for a woman he loves and the dream of becoming a writer. But his wayward son Alex is showing the same destructive impulses that nearly ruined Daniels himself. When a detective shows up on Daniel’s doorstep with the news that not only has Alex been killed in a botched bank robbery, he was a member of the gang trying to carry off the robbery. As time passes without an arrest, Daniels turns to past connections and takes matters into his own hands.
- From Ashes Rise: A Novel of Michigan.
- The Black Death: A Dead Man Novella.
