This paper discusses two young adult novels addressing the powerlessness of widows in India: Frances Mary Hendry's Chandra (1997); and Gloria Whelan's Homeless Bird (2000). These novels seek to introduce Western readers to the plight of young girls of a similar age in another culture. These texts about young Indian widows show one view of the position of women from a postcolonial perspective, but is this representative of all narratives written about Oriental cultures? Another recent series by Deborah Ellis,  about the situation faced by women and girls living under Islamic fundamentalist law,  presents female protagonists differently. Ellis's representations of the female protagonists Parvana and Shauzia diverge significantly from depictions of young women in Chandra and Homeless Bird. The differences between these pairs of novels require an analysis of the language used to convey ‘Otherness’.