Sixteen-year-old James is sent to the stagnant, humid town of Oakhaven to spend the summer with his estranged grandmother, Elspeth. Her Victorian home is a silent mausoleum packed with hundreds of porcelain dolls, each possessing hauntingly human "imperfections"?a chipped tooth, a faint scar, or a specific dimple. As the summer heat intensifies, James discovers old missing persons flyers in the local library and realizes the dolls in the parlor bear a terrifying resemblance to teenagers who vanished over the last thirty years. His unease spirals into a waking nightmare when he finds surgical tools and a massive industrial kiln in the basement?supplies not for toy-making, but for a grisly form of human taxidermy. Grandmother Elspeth begins to treat James as her "masterpiece," obsessing over his bone structure and symmetry. He suffers from paralyzing "nightmares" where his skin hardens into cold ceramic, only to realize he is being systematically prepared through chemically laced tea. The story culminates in the basement, where James lies conscious but immobile, watching his grandmother approach with a paintbrush to add the final, lifelike "stain" to his cheek before he is fired in the kiln to join the permanent collection.