This book was a gift from some friends, and like all good gifts, it’s something I’d never have chosen for myself: with occasional exceptions, I tend not to read books about wars. This novel is set in Newcastle in County Down, during the First World War. It is a fictionalised portrayal of an army unit set up to manufacture lifelike masks for soldiers who had suffered facial injuries during the war. It became known as ‘the tin nose shop’.

A novel about a British army unit stationed in Northern Ireland is not an obvious choice of subject for an American author, and it felt a little tonally off, but I enjoyed it nevertheless. It’s really a book about post-traumatic stress disorder and the horror of war, and Snyder leans in heavily to the obvious allegory of a mask of normality hiding life-changing wounds.

Before reading this book, I had no idea about the historical existence of the ‘tin nose shop’. The venue on which the one in the book is based was actually located in London; Snyder’s introduction talks about relocating it to Northern Ireland after he holidayed there. I’m not sure if this was the right decision: the inevitable inclusion of the Easter Rising felt like an unnecessary additional complication to the plot. It worked for me, though: the imagery was lent a poignant vivacity by my previous visits to the town.

Without wanting to spoil anything, I was also surprised and pleased by the ending. I wasn’t surprised by the revelations at the end of the book, but I was surprised and moved by how they played out.

This isn’t the sort of thing that I’d normally read, but I enjoyed it nevertheless.