Happier than We Deserve

By: Melissa Halcomb

Narrated by: Danielle Cohen

That terrible event Elizabeth and her family has ever dreaded has come to pass and brought with it changes which none of them could have anticipated. Faced with navigating a whole new world with whole new advantages, are they up to the task? Collecting marriage proposals like handkerchiefs, Elizabeth wonders if she might have spurned her one chance at lasting happiness when she learns that Mr Darcy is not at all who she believed him to be.

Darcy is tired of fighting his feelings. His heart knows what it wants, and that is Elizabeth Bennet. When he learns that Mr. Bennet has passed away, he imagines riding in as the white knight, a savior come to rescue his beloved from a life of poverty. But when he reaches Hertfordshire, something is amiss and he finds that Elizabeth needs no rescuing, thank you very much.

©2022 Melissa Halcomb (P)2024 Tantor

Pretty good

I enjoyed the story. The "rags to riches" trope is written well, just the way I believe Mr. Benet would have gone about it. While some of the story is understandably predictable and a tad corny, my only real issue with this was the fact that Darcy sounded like an absolute oaf. I'm uncertain why this specific voice was used for Darcy, but otherwise the narrator was quite decent. I felt the Lady Catherine part was incredibly rushed and a bit of a throwaway.

Great plot

First time listening to this author and narrator. I enjoyed the unexpected twists and turns to arrive at HEA.

Good story

Interesting take on pride and prejudice. Mr Bennet is an heir and gets a lot from his uncle. Nobody knows until he is dead. A little bit of angst. Great Jaff.

Reversal of fortune for the Bennet ladies.

Mr. Bennet has kept a great secret for almost all of his marriage, and when his will is read upon his passing and the secret revealed, everything changes for Mrs. Bennet and her daughters. Unlike her father, Jane decides to take over the guidance and education of her sisters, including Elizabeth. This Jane with a backbone was a pleasure to read. The HEA includes three brides—one may surprise you! I thought the premise was excellent and very well written. Lots of good dialogue. I like this author very much.
Danielle Cohen is a new-to-me narrator for the JAFF genre who I really enjoyed. She is very expressive in her narration without being over the top. I felt she performed the wonderful abundance of dialog extremely well. The one thing that could be improved upon, would be to perform a clearer distinction between the voicing the narration and some voices of the characters. I give 4.5* stars for her narration.

Enjoy variation

** spoiler alert ** Listened to and enjoyed this audiobook. It had some fun diversions from canon that mostly changed everything for the Bennets. One thing I didn't like was that it painted Mr. Bennet as a bad guy for not telling his family that they would be well taken care of after his death. I liked that they didn't know all the truth of it but why not allow them to know they would be taken care of even if they didn't know how well? I didn't like that he ended up being a bad father in their eyes when he had actually done well with the inheritance and investing etc. to have them in a perfect situation upon his death.

I always love a strong Jane trope. But it seemed odd that she completely took the parental role, even over Lizzy instead of the two of them working together on it. I was surprised that Lizzy didn't fight against some of her strictures without some explanation. 'I've always walked out on my own.' 'Yes but now you must set the example for your younger sisters so they do not run wild. And it isn't appropriate even for you, dear sister.'

Loved that Mrs. B enjoyed not being in charge and was happy to let Jane take the reins. And I loved her romance.

I loved Darcy and once they got past the misunderstandings and so forth, his relationship with Lizzy was very sweet. And I liked that Georgiana played more of a role in the story and wasn't too overly timid.

Not sure how I felt about the Bingley situation. I get it but somehow it doesn't set right to have that not end up as canon wills it to be. But that's fine.

All the characters we love to hate made an appearance-Lady C, Wickham, Collins, Caroline but they played fairly minor roles. Wickham had a bigger part and was quite nasty. Lady C was shocking.

The narrator did a good job and it was enjoyable to listen to this book.

Sex: some thoughts of desire
Language: yes, some
Violence: yes, some

good story, disconcerting narration

I particularly liked the character development of the bennet ladies in this story, but I can't get over the d r a m a t i c narration. this regency romance is read with the same theatrics as a child's bedtime story, with eXagGeRaTeD dialogue and stagy pacing. even sped up to 1.10x the listening experience felt like it was dragging through molasses. might be worth skipping the audiobook and getting a digital copy for people with the time to sit down and read to themselves

Please Replace Vaudevillian Voice Actor

Over emphasized ‘emoting’ is immediately off-putting: consistently over dramatic, almost comically overdone. The irritating performance detracts attention from the story. Strongest impression that the listener takes away is that the gratingly obnoxious voice performance overwhelmingly spoils the experience.

Wanted to like it

While there were some details I enjoyed, I had a hard time with both the narration and the pacing of the story. Wasted a credit.

Bennetts not poor

I love the way Elizabeth dealt with Wickham and the put down of the Bingley sisters