
Home of the Happy
A Murder on the Cajun Prairie
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Narrated by:
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Christine Lakin
About this listen
A compelling blend of true crime and memoir tracing the author’s investigation into the kidnapping and murder of her great-grandfather in 1980s Louisiana and the reverberations on her family and community throughout the decades
""Riveting and atmospheric, Home of the Happy is also a heartfelt grappling with a trauma in the author’s family and her attempts to unravel its secrets once and for all. LaHaye Fontenot’s writing is urgent, fueled not just by a desire for justice but by love for her ancestors and the Cajun community of south Louisiana. A must-read for true crime and mystery fans.""— Ana Reyes, New York Times bestselling author of The House in the Pines
On January 16, 1983, Aubrey LaHaye’s body was found floating in the Bayou Nezpique. His kidnapping ten days before sparked “the biggest manhunt in the history of Evangeline Parish.” But his descendants would hear the story as lore, in whispers of the dreadful day the FBI landed a helicopter in the family’s front lawn and set out on horseback to search for the seventy-year-old banker.
Decades later, Aubrey’s great-granddaughter Jordan LaHaye Fontenot asked her father, the parish urologist, to tell the full story. He revealed that to this day, every few months, one of his patients will bring up his grandfather’s murder, and the man accused of killing him, John Brady Balfa, who remains at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola serving a life sentence. They’ll say, in so many words: “Dr. Marcel, I really don’t think that Balfa boy killed your granddaddy.”
For listeners of Maggie Nelson’s The Red Parts and Emma Copley Eisenberg's The Third Rainbow Girl, Home of the Happy unravels the layers of suffering borne of this brutal crime—and investigates the mysteries that linger beneath generations of silence. Is it possible that an innocent man languishes in prison, still, wrongly convicted of murdering the author’s great-grandfather?
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2025 Jordan LaHaye Fontenot (P)2025 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
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Death on the Devil's Teeth
- The Strange Murder That Shocked Suburban New Jersey
- By: Mark Moran, Jesse P. Pollack
- Narrated by: Tom Campbell
- Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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As Springfield residents decorated for Halloween in September 1972, the crime rate in the quiet, affluent township was at its lowest in years. That mood was shattered when the body of sixteen-year-old Jeannette DePalma was discovered in the local woods, allegedly surrounded by strange objects. Some feared witchcraft was to blame, while others believed a serial killer was on the loose. Rumors of a police coverup ran rampant, and the case went unsolved along with the murders of several other young women.
By: Mark Moran, and others
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Story of a Murder
- The Wives, the Mistress, and Dr. Crippen
- By: Hallie Rubenhold
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 16 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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On February 1, 1910, the vivacious, diamond-adorned music hall performer Belle Elmore suddenly vanished from her home, causing alarm among her friends, the entertainers of the Music Hall Ladies’ Guild. Their demands for an investigation would lead to the unearthing of a gruesome secret and trigger a fevered international manhunt for Belle’s husband, medical fraudster Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen.
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Great but none of the heart of The Five
- By S. Armor on 04-13-25
By: Hallie Rubenhold
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On Father's Day
- By: Megan Norris
- Narrated by: Ella James
- Length: 14 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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When Cindy Gambino dropped her three boys off at their dad's on Father’s Day 2005 she had no idea she would never see them again. By day’s end, their bodies lay at the bottom of an icy dam, a tragedy that sparked one of the most controversial and prolonged murder cases in Australian history. Award-winning author and journalist Megan Norris followed the case for eight years, chronicling Cindy’s heartbreaking journey through a trial, retrial, two failed appeals, and a 2013 High Court ruling that blocked Victorian father Robert Farquharson’s final bid for freedom.
By: Megan Norris
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The Serial Killer’s Apprentice
- And Other True Stories of Cleveland’s Most Intriguing Unsolved Crimes
- By: James Renner
- Narrated by: James Renner
- Length: 6 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Investigative reporter James Renner reopens cold cases that have baffled Clevelanders for years.
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Renner Rules!
- By MightySkunkGrrl on 01-30-25
By: James Renner
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A Better Ending
- A Brother's Twenty-Year Quest to Uncover the Truth About His Sister's Death
- By: James Whitfield Thomson
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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On a summer evening in 1974, Jim Thomson arrived home from a baseball game to the news that his younger sister, Eileen, had taken her own life. To Jim, his parents, and brother, the loss was unexpected and devastating. Only twenty-seven, Eileen had been living in California with her high school sweetheart, Vic, a cop. She had a circle of close friends and a job she loved. But details soon emerged that Eileen had been depressed, her storybook marriage plagued by infidelity and guilt.
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Kept us rapt!
- By HogWare on 05-18-25
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Hometown Betrayal
- A Tragic Story of Secrecy and Sexual Abuse in Mormon Country
- By: Emily Benedek
- Narrated by: Maria Mcann
- Length: 11 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Valarie Clark Miller seemed to have it all. Smart and beautiful with a wealthy, successful husband and growing family, Valarie appeared to be the picture-perfect Mormon wife. But it was all a façade. Inside, she was crumbling from the pressures of long-repressed memories of a childhood filled with sexual and physical abuse.
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Well written and very eye-opening
- By Eliza on 06-07-25
By: Emily Benedek
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The Fairbanks Four
- Murder, Injustice, and the Birth of a Movement
- By: Brian Patrick O’Donoghue
- Narrated by: Chris Henry Coffey
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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October, 1997. Late one night in Fairbanks, Alaska, a passerby finds a teenager unconscious, collapsed on the edge of the road, beaten nearly beyond recognition. Two days later, he dies in the hospital. His name is John Gilbert Hartman and he's just turned 15 years old. The police quickly arrest four suspects, all under the age of 21 and of Alaska Native and American Indian descent. Police lineup witnesses, trials follow, and all four men receive lengthy prison terms. Case closed. But journalist Brian Patrick O'Donoghue can't put the story out of his mind.
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Heartbreaking
- By Dean Cook on 06-02-25
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A Murder Without Motive
- The Killing of Rebecca Ryle
- By: Martin McKenzie-Murray
- Narrated by: Adam Fitzgerald
- Length: 6 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2004, the body of a young Perth woman was found on the grounds of a primary school. Her name was Rebecca Ryle. The killing would mystify investigators, lawyers, and psychologists - and profoundly rearrange the life of the victim's family. It would also involve the author's family, because his brother knew the man charged with the murder. For years, the two had circled each other suspiciously, in a world of violence, drugs, and rotten aspirations.
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A Devil Went Down to Georgia
- Race, Power, Privilege, and the Murder of Lita McClinton
- By: Deb Miller Landau
- Narrated by: Callie Beaulieu
- Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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The 1987 murder of Lita McClinton Sullivan sent shock waves through the affluent Atlanta suburb of Buckhead, Georgia like few other crimes before it. The neighborhood, with its stately mansions and top-tier schools, was simply not the kind of place where women were gunned down in broad daylight. How many socialites had enemies so dangerous they would be murdered by a hit man pretending to deliver roses on an early winter morning?
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Great details
- By Linda on 06-04-25
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Blood in the Water
- The Untold Story of a Family Tragedy
- By: Casey Sherman
- Narrated by: Casey Sherman
- Length: 8 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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When Nathan Carman, a young man with a complicated past, is miraculously rescued from a lifeboat bobbing in the unforgiving North Atlantic, questions swirl about the fate of his mother, who is presumed to have drowned when their fishing boat sank. Nathan is in remarkably good shape for being lost at sea for a week, and his account of what exactly happened out there on the waves raises questions from family members and law enforcement.
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That I did begin to wonder if Nathan was guilty, unfortunately ultimately despite questions I do believe he was guilty.
- By Jennifer G. on 05-28-25
By: Casey Sherman
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The Dark Legacy
- Unveiling the Top 10 Serial Killers of the United States: A Criminologist’s In-depth Behavioral Analysis
- By: Dr. Phillip D. Clingan
- Narrated by: Jon Lobb
- Length: 11 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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In the annals of crime, the sinister figures known as serial killers cast a long, chilling shadow. From the infamous to the lesser-known "The Dark Legacy: Unveiling the Top 10 Serial Killers of the United States," delves into the author's behavioral analysis of the killer's twisted minds and macabre deeds of history's most notorious serial rapists and serial murderers. In this book, you'll encounter Ted Bundy's meticulous planning, John Wayne Gacy's enigmatic charisma, and Samuel Little's haunting legacy.
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The Devil in My Friend
- The Inside Story of a Malibu Murder
- By: Ivor Davis, Sally Ogle Davis
- Narrated by: Liam Price
- Length: 9 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Ivor and Sally Davis were horrified when their Malibu neighbors, Verna Roehler and her son, Doug died in a terrible boating accident. The nightmare only continued when her husband, their friend, Fred Roehler, was arrested and then convicted for their murder. As investigative writers they set out hoping to find Roehler innocent—instead they found a viper's nest of deceit and murder.
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Worst narrator
- By Emilie M (Pilates) on 05-17-25
By: Ivor Davis, and others
The narrator absolutely butchered so many names
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Pronunciations
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Story
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Shedding a light on dark family history
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I just had to keep reading!
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Very well written/ Horribly read
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Fascinating story!
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wow! what an interesting story
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Great book but so-so reader
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Research!
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