A Good Marriage

By: Stephen King

Narrated by: Jessica Hecht

Length: 3 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's Summary

What happens when, on a perfectly ordinary evening, all the things you believed in and took for granted are turned upside down?

When her husband of more than 20 years is away on one of his business trips, Darcy Anderson looks for batteries in the garage. Her toe knocks up against a box under a worktable and she discovers the stranger inside her husband. It’s a horrifying discovery, rendered with bristling intensity, and it definitively ends a good marriage.

©2014 Stephen King (P)2014 Simon & Schuster Audio

Buy Full Dark, No Stars

If you are looking to read "A Good Marriage" and "Big Driver", you should buy "Full Dark, No Stars" instead. Both short stories are apart of that book and you will get two more other novellas. I forgot that I already read "A Good Marriage" after I saw the movie. That's why I bought this story again. I was about to buy "Big Driver" after I saw the commercial on Lifetime, but glad that I did some digging because I already read it. Hopefully, they will make "1922" into a film from "Full Dark, No Stars". That is the best story out of the four. As for "A Good Marriage", the movie comes close to the short story.

Captivating story.

What made the experience of listening to A Good Marriage the most enjoyable?

I read this shortly after binge-watching the show Who the Bleep Did I Marry. While I'm pretty sure it spoiled the reveal, I still enjoyed King's pacing and character development. I really like and sympathized with Darcy. While the ending was not terribly surprising, it felt right.

What didn’t you like about Jessica Hecht’s performance?

Hecht's performance was off because she injected levity and laughter when it really did not fit. A more somber reader would have felt more realistic.

Getting Away With Murder?

What did you love best about A Good Marriage?

This is the story of a woman who has been happily married to a good man for many, many years. He's never been anything but good to her and a wonderful father to her children. But one day, while she's looking for something in the garage, she finds his secret hiding place. A box that is full of something that will change everything she thought she knew about him. Can she keep that secret from him? Can she live her life and pretend that she doesn't know that her husband is not who she thought he was? What would you do? Would you want to end a marriage with a man you'd loved your whole life? It's a good story. Stephen King doesn't tell bad stories. The narrator was a bit annoying when she did the wife's voice but the story was good enough to overlook that. I would recommend this one. It's good.

Worst choice for a narrator I could imagine!

I have never felt so compelled to write a review for anything as I do for this book. The story was ok, typical of the author, no surprises... the ending was lackluster. The part that was almost unbearable was the narrator. It almost made me not finish the book. The wife's voice was comical and sing-song. It sounded as if she were constantly giggling to some inside joke. And the men's voices were just as annoying. I will never listen to anything narrated by this person, and I would suggest listening to the voice sample of the book before purchase. I am mad I wasted my credit!

Great story

Would you listen to A Good Marriage again? Why?

I read it previously in Full Dark, No Stars. I would read it again but not this audio version. The narration was worse than horrible. The sing-song fake sounding voice did not match the dark story. She actually sounded like a cartoon character when she spoke as Darcy. I've listened to at least 200 audio books This one was bad, bad, bad. It should be pulled and narrated by someone else, in my opinion.

The performance kills the story/ends the marriage

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

I should have listened to the audio sample! The narrator and her narration are unlistenable. Her voice is grating and her reading style is stilted, with odd pauses and inflections. I have never have bothered listening to the audio sample and I've been burned a couple times now.

Would you ever listen to anything by Stephen King again?

YES! I love some of his work. It's hit or miss, but even the misses have their good points.

Would you be willing to try another one of Jessica Hecht’s performances?

No, never.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Disappointment, straight up. I couldn't even move into the territory of anger or sadness, because the disappointment ended the whole experience early.

Did she know?

In 2000, I had a Palm III, a handheld computer a little larger and heavier than today's iPhone 5. It had a stylus a special way to synchronize and write, and (available for separate purchase) a camera and a keyboard. It also had the world's first mass-market ebook, Stephen King's "Riding the Bullet". The eerily floating gray-green words on a black screen; sentences and paragraphs scrolling automatically at my exact reading speed; and a late evening with the lights off and a glass of good red wine made that novella mean more to me than it ever did on actual paper.

"A Good Marriage" was originally published in Stephen King's 2010 novella collection, "Full Dark, No Stars". The book sold well - all of King's books do - but I thought the stories were lackluster, or tried too hard to shock, or both. When I finished the read, I put the hardback on my bookshelf, and so thoroughly forgot it I didn't remember reading about the 27 year marriage of Darcy and Bob Anderson when I clicked "purchase" on Audible.

The turned out to be a fortunate mistake. "A Good Marriage" (2014 Audible copyright) works very well as an audio narration because of the excellent performance by Jessica Hecht. Hecht becomes the credulous, complacent and self-satisfied Darcy who literally stumbles across her husband Bob's secret. Hecht's about the same age as the fictional homemaker, and plays the sweet, even tempered woman unwittingly married to a man who bears a physical and avocational resemblance to Dennis Rader, the BTK killer. King imagines an answer to a question we've all asked, "Did Paula Rader know? Did Green River Killer Gary Ridgeway's wives Marcia or Judith know? Did they?"

Hecht's performance makes a so-so story chilling and memorable, just as delivering "Riding the Bullet" electronically made that story frightening and unforgettable.

The Audible release must be timed to coincide with the October 3, 2014 release of the film adaptation of "A Good Marriage" starring Anthony LaPaglia and Joan Allen. I haven't seen it, so I don't know how the movie compares to the book compares to the Audible.

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Buy Full Dark, No Stars

Any additional comments?

This is a good story with good narration so I can't mark it as a bad, but the description is misleading. This is a single story out of the collection Full Dark, No Stars. I still feel cheated.

great story, not so much with the narrator

What aspect of Jessica Hecht’s performance would you have changed?

No disrespect to Ms. Hecht, this is the second story by Stephen King that I have listened to her being the narrator and each time I just do not like her voice. The inflections, the breathy-ness of it, the sound as if she is smirking or making a joke of a line when she should not be.

Loved it

wasn't sure I would in the beginning but loved the courage Darcy showed with her difficult decision.