I do think that the flow was slow at times. I don’t want to spoil for other readers, but I definitely wonder what would have happened if Elena had lived. She was always something else depending on the audience. I think that it was good to get a sense of Elena at the beginning and to see why she was pretty much a chameleon with everyone she met. The secondary characters we follow, Sarah Gordon who finds Elena’s body, Elena’s father who is hoping to be named Chair at the college, her stepmother Justine who resents Elena and a lot of other things in her marriage, Elena’s embittered mother, several men who loved and were in turns frustrated with her.

Hopefully in the next book that’s laid to rest. However, she’s running out of time to decide what to do with her mother. She’s not as fragile in this one I think.

She’s doing great with not letting things that people say to her bother her. Havers I felt the most sorry for in this one. I kept hoping someone would smash her brother in law’s head in. Living with her sister who is suffering from post-partum but also her loss of self due to her husband and his demands one does not wonder why she’s reluctant to be with Lynley and be his wife. Helen is still reluctant to be with Lynley. However, we come to realize why Helen’s sister Pen is a good woman to have involved in this. And then Lynley sees a way to see Helen and involve her sister in the case which at first I was kind of rolling my eyes about. He and Havers play off each other very well. He is still thinking of Helen, but not to the detriment of the case. Lynley and Havers work together very well in this one and their dynamic is more solid. Lynley happily because Lady Helen is there with her sister and he thinks once again he can make his case for her to love and be with him. Lynley volunteers to go in after Scotland Yard is requested to oversee things. When she’s found murdered it ends up not only affecting her father, mother, and stepmother, but many people who all seemed to think that they knew the real Elena. Stephen’s College and had some rocky times at school and with her father and their relationship. “For the Sake of Elena” has Scotland Yard called in when a young woman, Elena Weaver, is found murdered during her morning run. Havers struggles with whether she can keep having a neighbor watch her mother or finally have her mother at a home where she can be safe, and Havers can have some sort of life. We also get a great look at Havers home life now that her father has passed. I have to say that George did a masterful job of peeling off the layers of who murdered Elena Weaver as well as how Lynley has been selfish in his pursuit of Lady Helen.

For the sake of elena elizabeth george