A lyrical, yet curiously lifeless, fictional account of disfigured soldiers during the First World War, and the professionals who sought to aid their return to society. Two characters, Anna Coleman and Varaztad Kazanjian, are based on the real life prosthetic artist and pioneer of plastic surgery, and Dr McCleary is perhaps modelled on eminent surgeon Harold Gillies, but the meandering plot and tortured romances are pure fiction.

A grieving widow named Catherine becomes immersed in the horrors of war when her late husband's home is taken over as a military hospital. Every mirror or reflective surface is removed before the first patients arrive, because Dr McCleary knows that 'the truth won't heal these men'. An artist and a dental surgeon from America join McCleary's team, to document, repair and disguise the horrific injuries of the soldiers, and one of the patients is chosen to be fitted with a lifelike mask. Both Catherine and Anna fall for Julian during the process of recreating his pre-war face out of plaster, clay and then silver - Catherine turns him into her dead husband, and Anna sees only her own work. Meanwhile, Kazanjian loves Anna, and McCleary tries to save his young protegee from being sent to the Front.

I enjoyed reading The Crimson Portrait, although the flowery prose does occasionally go overboard: 'She desired to enter him like an infection, a worm, a bullet nestled at the point of impact, find the hidden place where he was wounded, mend him, and never leave'. But in between the raging metaphors lurks the odd powerful image, like 'the face itself was small as a bowl, but it contained the world'. The characters are merely devices, and there is little structure to the narrative - especially in the final few pages (what happened to Artis?) - but the bravery of those men with healthy bodies and broken faces, and the destruction and loss of war, tell the real story.

A fascinating introduction to the field of plastic surgery as pioneered by men like Kazanjian and Gillies, and the aesthetic assistance of talented artists like Anna Coleman Ladd. ( )

I was intrigued by this book as soon as I read the synopsis: a book set in World War One involving facially disfigured veterans! That was something that I hadn't read before, at least in fiction. I had to have it.

The author's style isn't the best, and she spends a great deal of time using flowery words and even more flowery imagery. The author tended to use a lot of medical terminology and situations with the air of only flaunting her knowledge. There are a lot of people "introduced" in the book, but very few become anything more than a line or two. I don't think that any of the characters were particularly well-developed.

My biggest criticism of this book is the "character" of Anna Coleman, who was painted to be rather selfish. I think this is a great injustice to the real Anna Coleman Ladd, and I don't think it's right to play around with a real person and make her appear so unsympathetic in fiction.

Why did I rate the book three stars, then? I loved Julian, or at least the idea of him. There were some really great lines in the book too. Mostly, though, I love that this book dares to venture into often unexplored territory when it comes to fiction. I wish that there were more books that dealt with this time frame and these circumstances - except I'd like them to be written with a better style and more character development. ( )

Jody Shields tells the story of a very selfish, depressed war widow and the medical staff that transforms her home into a medical ward for soldiers with facial deformities. Catherine's husband is presumed dead, and she emits all of her passion and longing for him onto Julian, who, with the help of the artist Anna and Dr. McCleary, is surgically transformed into her deceased husband.

The story is beautifully written. Shields transformed the reader into fly on the wall of a WWI medical unit for the grizzliest of war injuries: facial deformities. I tasted the wine Dr. McCleary enjoyed, I felt the heat that emitted from Catherine when Julian walked into the room. The ending, though, was disappointing. The meeting of Anna and Kazanjian in the epilogue was believable, but the direct manner in which Anna described their friends' demise was unflattering. I wished for more. ( )

The Crimson Portrait by Jody Shields was a novel about the importance of faces, reflections and appearances. If your face became disfigured, how would it change you as a person? How would others perceive you?

Catherine was a lonely widow living on her husband’s estate during World War I. Her husband, Charles, offered up the estate prior to his death so it could be used as a hospital. Catherine had no choice but to watch a medical team convert her home into a hospital for men suffering from severe facial disfigurements. Their first order of business was to remove all mirrors – making the estate a place of no reflections.

At the estate, the physicians performed surgeries on these men in an attempt to restore their faces. For the unrestorable, the doctors turned to thin prosthetic masks, created by artist Anna Coleman. Their first subject was a young soldier named Julian, who was having an affair with the emotionally fragile Catherine. Anna needed to create a mask in the likeness of Julian prior to his injuries, and Catherine made a dangerous decision: to provide a picture of Charles as the pre-injured Julian so that Julian’s face would resemble her dead husband. Catherine, in effect, missed her husband so much that only his face would do on her lover’s body. But did it work to erase her demons?

The characters in this book were elegantly drawn. Catherine was depicted as severely depressed and delusional. The doctors battled between emotional attachments and treating their scarred patients. And the men battled their own demons, left with able bodies and faces that scared people.

Throughout this story, I often contemplated that it would translate well into the big screen. I think the medicinal and surgical aspect of The Crimson Portrait would draw audiences right in. And the unforgettable, flawed characters would seem human and familiar, especially considering our current state of military affairs.

Until the movie is made (if it’s ever made), I would recommend The Crimson Portrait to readers of World War I fiction or to those who are interested in stories that have medical theme. For certain, The Crimson Portrait is a medical book and one should find medicine interesting to enjoy this story. All in all, Jody Shields told a compelling and thought-provoking story about the love and loss of the human face – and human life. ( )

Sheilds explores the lives and relationships of a group of people living and working in a mansion that has been turned into a hospital for World War I soldiers returning from the battlefield with severe facial injuries. Catherine, the estate's owner, grieves for the husband lost in the war and becomes obsessed with Julian, an injured soldier who resembles her dead husband. Anna, an artist, has volunteered to record the injuries and to help design prostheses. Kassavian, a dentist, has become a specialist in facial injuries. The cynical Dr. Brownlow eases the trauma of his experience with an addiction to ether. Ardis, a servant in the household, is learning everything he can about medicine--until he learns that he is about to be drafted. The book is a bit slow going and has several disturbing and/or unbelievable moments. Let me just say that with facial injuries being as common as they were during World War I, and as shocking as they may have been, I find it unlikely that British citizens would not recognize what had happened to a young man wearing a prosthesis (or not wearing one) and would chase him down screaming "Monster!" Overall, an OK book. ( )