Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding (Epub)

Description

This laugh-out-loud chronicle charts a year in the life of Bridget Jones, a single girl on a permanent, doomed quest for self-improvement–in which she resolves to: visit the gym three times a week not merely to buy a sandwich, form a functional relationship with a responsible adult, and not fall for any of the following: misogynists, megalomaniacs, adulterers, workaholics, chauvinists or perverts. And learn to program the VCR. Caught between her Singleton friends, who are all convinced they will end up dying alone and found three weeks later half-eaten by an Alsatian, and the Smug Marrieds, whose dinner parties offer ever-new opportunities for humiliation, Bridget struggles to keep her life on an even keel (or at least afloat). Through it all, she will have her readers helpless with laughter and shouting, “BRIDGET JONES IS ME!”

User’s Reviews

Amazon.com Review In the course of the year recorded in Bridget Jones’s Diary, Bridget confides her hopes, her dreams, and her monstrously fluctuating poundage, not to mention her consumption of 5277 cigarettes and “Fat units 3457 (approx.) (hideous in every way).” In 365 days, she gains 74 pounds. On the other hand, she loses 72! There is also the unspoken New Year’s resolution–the quest for the right man. Alas, here Bridget goes severely off course when she has an affair with her charming cad of a boss. But who would be without their e-mail flirtation focused on a short black skirt? The boss even contends that it is so short as to be nonexistent. At the beginning of Helen Fielding’s exceptionally funny second novel, the thirtyish publishing puffette is suffering from postholiday stress syndrome but determined to find Inner Peace and poise. Bridget will, for instance, “get up straight away when wake up in mornings.” Now if only she can survive the party her mother has tricked her into–a suburban fest full of “Smug Marrieds” professing concern for her and her fellow “Singletons”–she’ll have made a good start. As far as she’s concerned, “We wouldn’t rush up to them and roar, ‘How’s your marriage going? Still having sex?'” This is only the first of many disgraces Bridget will suffer in her year of performance anxiety (at work and at play, though less often in bed) and living through other people’s “emotional fuckwittage.” Her twin-set-wearing suburban mother, for instance, suddenly becomes a chat-show hostess and unrepentant adulteress, while our heroine herself spends half the time overdosing on Chardonnay and feeling like “a tragic freak.” Bridget Jones’s Diary began as a column in the London Independent and struck a chord with readers of all sexes and sizes. In strokes simultaneously broad and subtle, Helen Fielding reveals the lighter side of despair, self-doubt, and obsession, and also satirizes everything from self-help books (they don’t sound half as sensible to Bridget when she’s sober) to feng shui, Cosmopolitan-style. She is the Nancy Mitford of the 1990s, and it’s impossible not to root for her endearing heroine. On the other hand, one can only hope that Bridget will continue to screw up and tell us all about it for years and books to come. –Kerry Fried From Booklist In the wake of the hit TV show Ally McBeal, the market for stories about the lives of hip single women continues to boom. Now British journalist Fielding, in her first novel, which is already a best-seller in Britain, blows all the competition right out of the water. Wry diarist Bridget Jones details a year in her life and her endless search for “inner poise.” Such poise is hard to come by when you’ve invited 10 people to a five-course dinner party, and the velouteof tomato comes out blue because detergent was left in the blender. But Bridget is a master at turning humiliation into ever funnier riffs on everything from date preparation (“Being a woman is worse than being a farmer–there’s so much harvesting and crop spraying to be done”) to the pleasures of Yuletide (“I hate Christmas. Everything is designed for families, romance, warmth. . . . It makes you want to emigrate to a vicious Muslim regime, where at least all the women are social outcasts”). Brimming with a deliciously irreverent sense of humor and a keen sense of women’s deepest insecurities, Bridget Jones’s Diary is a must-read. Joanne Wilkinson Review “Screamingly funny!”—USA Today“Bridget Jones is channeling something so universal and (horrifyingly) familiar that readers will giggle and sigh with collective delight.”—Elle“Fielding . . . has rummaged all too knowingly through the bedrooms, closets, hearts, and minds of women everywhere.”—Glamour“Hilarious and poignant.”—The Washington Post“Bridget Jones’s diary has made her the best friend of hundreds of thousands of women.”—The New York Times“A brilliant comic creation. Even men will laugh.”—Salman Rushdie

Reviews from Amazon users, collected at the time the book is getting published on UniedVRG. It can be related to shiping or paper quality instead of the book content:

⭐ I loved watching the movie version of this book, and I enjoyed how the characters were varied, but recognisable. The book, however, is far more raunchy, and goes into a really dark place towards the end. There are scenes I can recall from the movie showing up in the book (or vice versa really), and by and large the general thrust of the story still follows pretty closely. However, there are details that you can’t quite show in the movie that show up in the book that fill in the blanks. The movie presents Bridget and Daniel’s initial relationship as a whirlwind romance, whereas in the book, it paints a much sadder picture. Bridget clearly wants /something/ out of it, and Daniel is interested in either a hook up, or watching TV. He can barely hold a conversation with Bridget, and the guy has all the romance of a teenage boy. It makes their relationship all the more depressing, but also fleshes it out way more clearly when we figure out that Daniel’s been with that other woman all along. It makes more /sense/ for that Daniel to do what he did.Same goes for Mark. In the movie, it seems like all of a sudden there’s this switch that flips, where Mark and Bridget are into each other. In the book, you see that cat and mouse game carry through, which makes their eventual getting together make way more sense. It’s a series of they tried to get together, but either circumstances, Natasha, or International embezzlement and fraud would get in the way of that magic happening. It wasn’t some snooty prince come down off his high horse to fraternise with the commoners. It was more of a slow burn that had been building throughout the story, with a much more satisfying conclusion.If you like the movie (or even if you didn’t like the movie), definitely give the book a read. It’s very enjoyable.

⭐ I don’t think I’ve encountered a more insufferable protagonist in all my life. Bridget Jones spends the entire novel obsessing about finding a boyfriend, and in the end, finds one she doesn’t deserve, with little character growth or justification. It didn’t feel self-aware enough to be a satire, though I can’t imagine what the point might be. Vicious sexual assault is treated as a plot mechanism to advance Bridget’s career in the salacious news imdustry while the protag whines about modern single life over champagne at dinner parties. It’s like reading what a misogynist must think women are really like. I’m adding a star because Mark Darcy is hot. But that might well be due to the fact I keep picturing him as Colin Firth. I don’t even know who I would recommend this to. People who need a wake-up call, perhaps. Go see the movie instead.

⭐ This book officially falls into the same category for me as Pretty Little Liars: silly fluff that I normally would not read, but for some reason I just cannot put my finger on, it intrigues me.But, it started out almost as a book I was going to abandon, because she about drove me crazy at the start (and, frankly, through the whole book) with her updates and moanings and groanings about her weight. And while I am not looking to start any debate about weight issues with my review, I do feel that when you are around 120-130 pounds, you don’t have much to complain about as far as being fat goes. UNLESS you have COMPLETELY bought into society’s view on things. And, let’s face it…at the time this book came out (1996), society was pretty much into thin, thin, thin. It is not like now, 19 years later where people are starting to be a bit more accepting of all body types…especially recognizing the effect that the media has on girls and women.But, the more I got into the book, the more the soap opera feel of the book took hold, and I just became hooked. Now, I am not one to watch soap operas except on those rare occasions that I for some reason get hooked into one. BUT, I do like a good drama, and sometimes one needs a bit of fluff. Especially when one reads a lot of dark mysteries and whatnot like I do all the time. Sometimes it is nice to read about problems like Bridget’s that have to do with men, and being single, family rather than people being murdered and creepers around every corner.To be honest, this is a series that I have been terribly interested in for ages. Probably for a decade or more. I just never made the time for the book or the movie. And now that I have, I have to admit that I am kind of glad that I did. Even though I am not totally gushing about the book, and I did watch part of the movie yesterday (no, my rating is not AT ALL based on the movie…just on the book), and the movie, of course, deviates from the book wildly. It was kind of fun to read after awhile, and I enjoyed settling down at the end of the day with a book that wasn’t going to scare the pants off of me. Because while I do love that adrenaline rush, sometimes it is better to just relax.

⭐ Overall, I thought this book was just okay. It wasn’t one of the best books I’ve read but it wasn’t bad either. It is set up like an actual diary and has the personal thoughts Bridget Jones, the main character of the novel. The author’s writing style is very conversational, and it almost feels like Bridget wrote this diary for people to read. It is interestingly real, describing the gossip that is circling Bridget’s work or people’s feminist opinions. I liked the real aspect and seeing how society has a role in people’s lives. Bridget admits that she is a child of Cosmopolitan culture and we see her try to lose weight throughout the book. However, some could see this as being concerned for the wrong reasons. Bridget is obsessed with her weight and what others think of her. This book portrays how some people are so obsessed with what society thinks of them and they do not make a life of their own. On a different note, there is humor in the book, and I found myself laughing at some points. If I were to recommend this book, I would recommend it to someone who likes chick-flick types of movies. I also caution that it gets really slow towards the middle. At some points, I thought there was no point to the story and the plot was not that strong. Towards the end, the action picks up and it gets interesting. If you like a thrilling page-turner, I would not recommend this book for you.

⭐ Helen Fielding is an excellent comedic in this Bridget series. The first portion of the book Bridget had me laughing right at the start. Her New Years resolution was long with will not and wills. But there were some resolutions that I could even relate to.The English slang words were both cute and funny. There’s also Jone’s abbreviations (i.e.: v. and v.g. = very and very good) that even I found myself using for a little while.Her love triangle with her boss Daniel Cleaver (all bad boy) and lawyer Mark Darcy (good guy) is really romantic. Daniel is the guy that she resolved not to obsess about as he is an alcoholic, workaholic, commitment phobic, chauvinist and emotional f-wits (all things she also resolved not to fall for). Mark is the good guy who finishes last. Yes, he was already taken (the woman was a crazy needy woman who didn’t love him). Yes, he couldn’t make decision or stand up for himself (the clothes he wore were his mother’s choices). But after a while I could tell that she should pick the lawyer over the cheat.This is a good Brit-lit series (2 1/2 books). Bridget is a little over the top at times, but that’s what makes the character so funny.

⭐ I didn’t find this book “hilarious” and I didn’t “split a gut laughing”, but I got quite a few smiles and even more chuckles out of it. Just about every page had something cute or witty on it, which I found really enjoyable. I could definitely relate to Bridget & her eternal quests for happiness and a botfriend. Since there are so many reviews on this book explaining what it is about, I thought I’d write a few of my favorite lines from the book: “I realize it has become too easy to find a diet to fit in with whatever you happen to feel like eating and that diets are not there to be picked and mixed but picked and stuck to, which is exactly what I shall begin to do once I’ve eaten this chocolate croissant.” “Maybe Dad will appear hanging upside down outside the window dressed as a Morris dancer, crash in and start hitting Mum over the head with a sheep’s bladder; or suddenly fall facedown out of the airing cupboard with a plastic knife stuck in his back. The only thing which can possibly get everything back on course is a Bloody Mary. It’s nearly afternoon after all.” “…just had cigarette, but no-smoking day does not start officially until I have gotten dressed.” “…so all I’ve got to do is find someone or something to have power over and then…oh G*d, I haven’t even got power over my own hair.” “Twenty-two hours, four pizzas, one Indian takeaway, three packets of cigarettes and three bottles of champagne later, Daniel is still here. I am in love. I am also now between one and all of the following…a) back on thirty a day…b) engaged … c) stupid… d) pregnant.” Some of these quotes were taken out of context, but I still thought they were cute. All in all, this is a very entertaining book, well worth the read…and it’s a quick read, too, and makes for a fun weekend escape from reality.

⭐ I think I’ve seen the movie version about 20 times – oh how we love Colin Firth and Hugh Grant and even Renee Zellweger. And then I finally decided to read the book. The good news is: I LOVED the book. There are a few parts that were not in the movie, so it was still a refreshing and fun read. The not so bad news: I kept picturing/hearing Colin, Hugh, and Renee (and her band of friends) as I read through this. The bad news: I think there were scenes in the movie that were not in the book. I don’t recall exactly which, but I felt like I was having memory problems while reading the book and trying to recall the movie.Overall, if you’ve already seen the movie, all is not lost. Read the book! And then watch the movie again. Both are fun and worth it in their own rights.

⭐ I decided to read this book because it got so much press, and was made into a movie. Wow, do I regret that move. I did finish it, begrudgingly. The heroine is completely neurotic and therefore not likable. There’s no main story problem other than the heroine’s lack of a boyfriend, her neuroses and her obsessing over a guy who is only interested in a shag. Yuck. I won’t be reading any other books in this series!

⭐ I love all her books. Books better than the movie and all Helen Fielding’s books are to watch for because she keeps coming up with another on the theme of Bridget. Excellent series which gives writers lots of new ideas. Diaries are much better than journals, they reveal more and keep the interest going. An Indiana Jones read for women.

⭐ BRIDGET JONES’S DIARY is one of the funniest books ever. Written in the form of a journal, Bridget starts each entry with a set of statistics: alchohol consumed; cigarettes smoked; current weight; etc… You can watch her alchohol and cigarette consumption go up and down as her moods change day by day.Bridget’s journal chronicles life as a 30-something single gal living in London and living alone. She’s wishing she has a steady boyfriend. She finally gets involved with her boss Daniel Cleaver, and we watch as they progress from madly in lust to “ho hum”…. of course she later learns what a scum bag he is and so she’s back to square one. She also is fixed up with child hood friend Mark Darcy, who annoys her to no end.Besides trying to find that Mr Right, she’s also dealing with a mother who is going through a mid life crisis and that’s a story unto itself. And her on-going struggle with self improvement schemes is a riot.Bridget came across to me as someone who has a lot of self esteem, but at the same time is desperately trying to convince herself and others that she’s ok the way she is. She’s very vocal about her opinions, never gives up either when things are looking down. I really liked Bridget as a character, and saw a lot of her in me. Maybe that’s why I liked this book so much.

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