Face to Face

Imagine the face you've known all your life being so ravaged by cancer, an accident, a fall, a car crash or a gunshot wound that it is barely recognisable. Now imagine how it might feel, after microsurgery - the person you remember looking back at you once more. The author has helped countless individuals make this journey. This is his story.

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'Not just a brilliant introduction to one of the most exacting areas of modern medicine, it's a humbling glimpse of humans at their best.' Sunday Times

'Inspires wonder at all that modern medicine can achieve.' TLS

Think how much of your identity is vested in the face you see in the mirror every morning. Now imagine that face so ravaged by cancer, an accident, a car crash or a gunshot wound that it is barely recognizable. Consider how it might feel if, after surgery, the person you remember, but had given up all hope of seeing again, is looking back at you once more.

Over the years, world-leading maxillofacial surgeon Jim McCaul has helped countless people make this journey.

Face to Face is an extraordinary journey through the most high-tech and complex of microsurgical procedures, following the stories of some of the patients McCaul has saved from terrible illness and life-changing injuries – and some he wasn’t able to help. It guides us through the epic surgical procedures his job requires him to perform daily, where the margin for error is effectively zero, and reminds us of the game-changing reconstruction techniques pioneered during the First World War.

But at its heart are the human stories of the patients for whom McCaul's work is often quite literally a matter of life and death.