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The legend of Robin Hood gets a new spin in Elsa Watson's elegant debut, Maid Marian, a novel filled with adventure, romance, twelfth-century intrigue and a dollop of Peace Corps philosophy. As an orphaned child of secured royalty, Marian is a ward of the king and thus a political pawn. Wed at age five to Hugh of Sencaster, she becomes a widow at seventeen when Hugh dies under mysterious circumstances. Following her mourning period, Marian learns of communication between Lady Pernelle, her former mother-in-law, and Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, who holds the key to Marian's fate. Distrustful of Lady Pernelle, who'd balked before returning Marian's lands following Hugh's death, Marian seeks out the renowned Robin Hood to help intercept a letter between the two women. From it, she learns the queen has granted permission for marriage between Marian and Lady Pernelle's youngest son.

Dreading the prison of a loveless marriage again and unable to reconcile with the treacherous Lady Pernelle, Marian seizes the opportunity to escape when Robin Hood shows up on her wedding morning. She joins his band in Sherwood Forest and soon finds her friendship with Robin deepening into love. Before they can settle together, however, they must resolve the issue of Marian's lands, forfeited by her disappearance. After living with a peasant family, Marian disguises herself as a servant girl and gains a job at Lady Pernelle's estate, where she stumbles upon greater deception than ever expected.

Highlights in the book include Marion's overnight visit to her servant Annie's village home, a vivid scene that could have been taken from a Peace Corps journal. Through the long, awkward evening, Marian struggles with the strangeness of different customs, language and food. Both uncomfortable with and shocked by the poor accommodations, she wonders how she's going to survive the evening, much less the night. (Sounding familiar?) Also entertaining are the excellent descriptions of court life for a young noblewoman in the twelfth century, including the unlikely perspective of a five-year-old on her wedding day (wear stiff clothes, tug at heavy jewelry, recite words and then run off to play again).

The story's weakness, for me, lies three-quarters into the story, when two key issues are resolved. With a happy ending all but guaranteed and only sixty pages remaining, the page-turning momentum subsides. The recounting of how Robin and Marian scheme to outsmart the royals for repossession of Marian's land reads almost as a tacked-on