Tucker Reed

Early life

Aisling Tucker Moore Reed was born in Los Gatos, California, Santa Clara County. She is the daughter of New York Times best-selling authors Kelly Moore and Dan Reed. Through her maternal grandfather, United States Naval Air Force Commander Lundi Addison Moore, she claims descent from Jamestown settler and Mayflower Compact signer Stephen Hopkins.

She attended Ashland High School in Oregon. As a teenager, Reed gigged with an alternative rock band as a singer-songwriter, and performed lead roles in, as well as designed sets and costumes for, school and community theatre productions. She also served as a reporter, web designer and editor-in-chief for her high school's newspaper, The Rogue News. Reed went on to be recognized on the national level for her essays and short stories during her junior and senior years at Ashland High School.

In 2009, at age 19, Reed persuaded her mother to collaborate on a novel. Reed’s sister Larkin was later included in the collaboration as well. In 2011, the trio negotiated and received a reported six-figure financial deal with the Arthur A. Levine imprint of Scholastic Press for the North American rights to their planned Amber House Trilogy.

Reed attended the University of Southern California, where she studied broadcast journalism, theatre and cinema. She was a reporter and assistant editor for the university's student newspaper, the Daily Trojan, in 2010.

Career

Reed, along with her mother and younger sister Larkin, co-authored Amber House, the first installment of the Amber House trilogy, which was released by Scholastic's Arthur A. Levine Books imprint on October 1, 2012. Amber House received a positive critical reception, with Publishers Weekly praising the book's "intricate plot" and originality in a starred review, dubbing the story "rich, strange, and utterly fascinating." Kirkus Reviews singled out the book's heroine as being a "strong, admirable character" for young female readers, specifically contrasting her with Bella Swan from the Twilight franchise.

Amber House was a finalist for the 2014 Oregon Book Award for Young Adult Literature, and was selected for the Texas Library Association's 2014 TAYSHAS List. Reed acted as narrator of the audiobook edition of Amber House and its sequel Neverwas, which was released on January 7, 2014. Reed is also co-author of the series' forthcoming titles Ever Shall and Otherwhen.

In early 2016, she worked as a reporter for The Grants Pass Daily Courier before quitting in the spring.

Self-identified survivor of gendered violence

Reed first gained notoriety as an opponent of gendered violence (specifically sexual abuse against women) when she published the name of her alleged rapist to a blog. Reed has been characterized as part of a "vanguard of a new wave of activism." Australian criminologist and feminist Anastasia Powell identified Reed in 2015 as one of several women who used the internet to engage in what would traditionally be deemed "vigilante" behavior in "resistance to rape culture" in Rape Justice: Beyond the Criminal Law.

In September 2013, Reed spoke out as a proponent of "mandatory exit surveys" at college campuses, designed to better monitor the efficacy of policies and programs regarding student safety. Such surveys would, according to Reed, prevent internal corruption and dismissal of valid student claims because they would create an external reference monitoring whether colleges remain in compliance with the Clery Act and their own safety policies. Senator Claire McCaskill developed the Campus Accountability and Safety Act in 2015 using many of the suggestions Reed advocated for on HuffPost Live and in various publications.

Activism and self-advocacy

In 2013, Reed aided students at multiple institutions in filing Office for Civil Rights complaints against their colleges. In September 2013, Reed was recognized for her activism by the Veteran Feminists of America when she was awarded the Lucy Burns Challenger Award at the organization's 20th anniversary celebration. Reed received her honor alongside feminist icons such as attorney Gloria Allred, singer-songwriter June Millington and Grammy Award-winner Helen Reddy.

Reed helped to organize college students in support of women's rights and to raise public awareness about the issue of gendered violence, appearing on CNN, CBS, NBC, HuffPost Live and other news programs. Reed founded the Student Coalition Against Rape (SCAR), originally a sub-org at the University of Southern California and now a national organization. Reed has stated her hope "that, ultimately, sexual aggression will become as socially unacceptable as smoking in a crowded room."

Since late 2012, Reed has blogged for xoJane.com and the Huffington Post, and written for Cosmopolitan magazine.

Manslaughter charges

On July 26, 2016, Reed was arrested in connection with the fatal shooting of her 63 year old maternal uncle, Shane Moore; this occurred at his home in Applegate, Oregon. Reed's bail was set at $200,000. On July 29, 2016, Reed was indicted on charges of first and second degree manslaughter by a grand jury. When approached by the press, Reed's mother, Kelly Moore, said her daughter acted in self-defense against Mr. Moore, who had been threatening Ms. Reed and Ms. Moore and other members of the family and who was under specific court order to stay away from Ms. Reed after assaulting her in 2015. The first degree manslaughter charge alleges that Reed caused Moore's death by acting unlawfully and recklessly, and under circumstances "manifesting an extreme indifference to the value of human life." Reed's second degree manslaughter charge alleges she "unlawfully and recklessly" caused Moore's death.