Did you know that more than 100,000 thousand Chinese laborers worked in Europe doing support labor during World War I? Neither did I until reading Janie Chang’s historical novel The Porcelain Moon.

The novel tells a dual story, both tales set during WWI. Pauline is an illegitimate Chinese girl, being raised by an uncle who runs a shop that sells Chinese porcelain and artifacts in Paris. Her parents are both dead, and no one in the family but her uncle and his son Theo cares about what happens to her. Pauline is approaching the age when she will be forced back to Shanghai for a marriage arranged by Uncle’s wife, who despises her and has no reason to make a good match. Theo is also facing a dreaded arranged marriage, a prospect he delays by taking a job as an interpreter for the Chinese Labour Corps.

The other plot line concerns Camille Roussel, a young woman trapped in an abusive marriage to a man who is bent on making money from the war by any means available. Camille lives in Noyelles-sur-Mer, near one of the labor camps. When Pauline comes searching for her cousin, hoping Theo will help her avoid being sent back to China, the two young women meet and discover they share a bond that neither has suspected. A bond that involves a dangerous secret.

The spotlight this novel shines on the overlooked contribution Chinese laborers made to the war makes it worth reading. Unfortunately, I didn’t think the intertwined story of the two young women was really a strong enough vehicle for this important subject matter. Honestly, for the first half of the book, I had trouble keeping the two storylines separate in my mind. You’d think that having one character be French and the other Chinese would be enough of a distinction, but for much of the novel, both are victims trapped in difficult circumstances, so the two character arcs are too much the same. Each character also has a love story, neither of which I found compelling. And the ending was just a bit too easy for my taste.

I wish I could recommend this more strongly. I loved The Phoenix Crown, Chang’s collaboration with Kate Quinn and was eager to see what she’d produce on her own.