Set against the tense backdrop of the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, Saving Face: An Amish Tale of Horror, More or Less unfolds in the fictional rural township of Mercy Furnace, Pennsylvania. Esther King, a 79-year-old Amish widow experiencing macular degeneration, finds her quiet life disrupted when traditional, faceless children's dolls begin appearing on local porches-each meticulously painted with the uncanny faces of public figures, famous pop icons, and estranged family members.
As state troopers investigate, an opportunistic local tourist trap owner named Hal Brubaker schemes to acquire Esther's land for a highway interchange. Meanwhile, Esther's shunned artist son, Jonas, returns after twenty years to reconnect before her sight completely fails. Blending supernatural folk horror dread with absurd dark humor, the novel explores community boundaries, memory, and the faces we present to the world-culminating in a fateful Halloween night where the line between the living, the dead, and the faceless dissolves entirely.