Have you tried /usr/bin/say ? Might already have something sufficient for you - there’s quite a few voices there.
replyIn System Settings, if you go to Accessibility and click "Read & Speak" in the "Vision" section, you can select a different voice using the "System voice" section. Click the "(i)" to preview your various options and even download more. Some, like "Allison (Enhanced)," sound leagues better than the default voice.
replyGreat point! these are better than Samantha and they're free. But still, if I could wait a few seconds to get a much richer TTS experience I'd pay for that.
replyEasy to send one’s clipboard to Microsoft Azure and have their DragonHD voices read the text, say with Keyboard Maestro (or presumably Alfred, Raycast, etc.). Should work with selected text too.
replyYou’d definitely get to pay for it, not what I consider cheap. (“$15 per 1M characters”) But IMO just about best-in-class (maybe ElevenLabs has a voice I’d like even better).