A Bouquet of Bennets, Mary's Story Audiobook By Victoria Lynn cover art

A Bouquet of Bennets, Mary's Story

A Sweet Pride and Prejudice Variation

 Virtual Voice Sample
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A Bouquet of Bennets, Mary's Story

By: Victoria Lynn
Narrated by: Virtual Voice
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This title uses virtual voice narration

Virtual voice is computer-generated narration for audiobooks.

About this listen

 A Bouquet of Bennets is a five book series in which each of the Bennet sisters marries William Collins for different reasons. Each book is a stand-alone novel, the first being the story of least regarded Bennet, Mary.
When William Collins visits Longbourn, he is immediately drawn to Miss Mary Bennet, despite Mrs. Bennet’s determination that he will wed Elizabeth. As in canon, Bingley leases Netherfield, bringing his family and Darcy into Hertfordshire. Unlike canon, it is through Mary and Jane Bennet that Darcy discovers how poorly he has behaved and it is at the urging of Colonel Fitzwilliam that he begins to make the changes in manners and even in character that would allow him to approach a woman worthy of being pleased.
I hope you enjoy Mary’s story and will be equally pleased at the second bouquet, featuring Jane Bennet, due out in February 2024. Fiction Historical Fiction Women's Fiction
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A lovely opportunity for Mary to stand out from her more seemingly exceptional sisters. In this variation Mary has made a point of closely watching her family. She has made note of their flaws, as well as their obvious strengths.

When Mr Collins comes to choose his bride he notices Mrs Bennet attempting to push him at Elizabeth and her disinterest in anything to do with him. In contrast, he finds Mary a very interested and intelligent companion, one who shares his values and interests.

Both Mrs Bennet and Elizabeth are shocked that Collins prefers Mary over her more lovely sister, but in this story beauty is definitely in the eye of the beholder.

As Mary prepares to wed she attempts to illuminate things her sisters are willfully blind to…Wickham’s perfidy, Bingley’s caddish behavior, Lydia and Catherine’s bad behavior, and her father’s indifference to his family. She isn’t able to totally change hearts and minds but
with Collins’ support some big changes at Longbourn are put into place. And when the Collinses settle in at Hunsford Darcy and his family learn that bad behavior is not tolerated.

Slowly but surely the Bennet family, Darcy and Bingley learn to amend their attitudes and behavior. This is a lovely, low angst tale and this virtual voice is better than some I’ve heard (although changing “Darce” to “Dacre” does drive me a little nuts!).

Mary Bennet Stands Out

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I really enjoyed this book, in spite of the poor virtual voice narration. Finally people spoke up about how arrogant Elizabeth and her father were - and how ridiculously rude Lady Katherine behaved. I always wanted someone to call out Elizabeth for her opinionated ways. Mary and Collins were the stars of this book.

If only a real person performed it

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I really like this book. It is very low conflict and very sweet. Even the virtual voice is one of the better virtual voices. Even though it still would have been better with an actual voice actor.

Very sweet

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I love the books written by Victoria Lynn and was hoping to get some good narrations of them. This did not work. The flaws with Virtual Voice are too many.

1. Mispronouncing certain words: These were annoying. Rosings is pronounced as Rossings. Darce as Daykah. Landin as Londeen. Forté is forty. Hmmph is spelled out instead of pronounced. They are jarring.

2. Inflections and cadence: Questions have the exact same cadence every single time. And there are really long pauses between sentences and paragraphs. There are inflections but they feel forced.

3. Character voices: There is absolutely no change in character voices. Even the worst human narrators will try to change their voice between male and female but the VV does them all the same. We listen to human narrators because they give a human feel to the narration. They express the character's personality in their voice.

4. Emotion: There is no emotion at all. I mean none. Just imagine Mrs Bennet crying for her salts and fussing about her nerves with the same emotion as Charlotte Lucas asking you how you take your tea. Human narrators will give the right emotion to the dialogue in the book. VV doesn't have that.

The book is a lovely book but it was ruined by the narration. I tried it because it was free and I wanted to see if it was any good but I am not keeping it in my library. This was ruined by the narration. If it is ever re-released with human narration, I'd change my mind. But this doesn't work.

Love the story, hate the narration

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