How does the author use imagery in the novel, A Thousand Ships?

Haynes does not shy away from depicting the horrors of war in all their vividity, such as when she describes Polydorus’ corpse. His face is described as being, “bloated and blackened from the water, and the rocks… Part of his left cheek was torn away and there were purple welts around his neck” (165). The author spares us nothing, confronting us fully with the intimate, almost alien detail of the mutilation that an innocent boy has had inflicted on him.