I would go for near-field monitors, especially at this price. Anything Genelec, JBL, Adam is probably excellent. There are many more options. For objective, independent reviews I recommend www.audiosciencereview.com (many other review websites are sponsored and extremely subjective).
Optimal placement for the lowest frequencies is in or near a corner of the room. Optimal speaker placement for all higher frequencies is in front of you, 1m away or less, at or a little bit above ear height, in a symmetric triangle with your listening position.
So for optimal placement you can go for smaller speakers (e.g. Genelec 8010 or 8020) + subwoofer. I guess smaller speakers are also more wife-friendly .
Good speakers+good subwoofer is a bit more expensive. But even without subwoofer you can get very acceptable sound, because your ears can recognize the lowest frequencies by their harmonics even if they are not actually heard.