Time's tight for all of us. That's why you'll be tempted to skip reading Bridget Jones's Diary if you saw the movie. Don't!

The movie is, of course, darling with cute Renee Zellwenger, uptight but decent Colin Firth and Hugh Grant as the epitome of the gorgeous, smooth-talking cad. However, the book is much, much better. You'll miss the uproariously funny details inherent in the format of Bridget's diary (e.g., counting cigarettes and calories, the despair of falling off the wagon, the recriminations common to all young women's diaries -- and low self-esteem). Reading this was like reliving my own misspent youth. By necessity, the movie had to shear big sections of the book out of the screenplay -- and you won't want to miss a juicy day of Bridget's year-long diary. Also, the movie treatment of some of Bridget's adventures just aren't as clever or funny as Helen Fielding's handling.

It's a cliché to say you'll laugh out loud. But in this case, it's actually true. Don't miss reading Helen Fielding's gem just because you saw the big-screen version.

n  n
Instagram || Twitter || Facebook || Amazon || Pinterest


So I'm doing this thing where I'm rereading the books I read as a teen and trying to figure out whether they hold up to an adult's perspective or if they were just zeitgeist-appropriate crap. BRIDGET JONES is definitely not a teen book, but that didn't stop me from reading it anyway! Actually, the first time I read it, I was ten. My mom wouldn't let me have it because she was like, "She'll be a bad influence on you!" which meant me pulling up a chair to the bookshelf to get it from where she'd hidden it and staying up three nights straight to read it. Did ten-year-old me understand WTF Ms. Jones was on about? No. Did I suddenly start weighing myself and listing my meals in my journals just like she did because I thought it was cool and the Grown-Up Thing to Do? Yes. Did it mess me up for life? Well, no, but it did seem to turn me into a thirty-something Singleton so maybe that's The Curse of the Book.



I'm not sure there's a book out there that captures the life of the thirty-something single woman quite like this one. Bridget is so relatable and so funny. She's like the perfect blend of good girl/bad girl, and her dynamics with her friends and family were such a delight to read and made her feel like such a well-rounded character. I did think the movie was better since so much of the focus is on Daniel that Darcy almost feels like an afterthought and when his feelings do crop up, they seem to come out of nowhere. It's funny that Hugh Grant and Colin Firth were chosen for the roles because both of the actors are actually mentioned in this book (which I thought was super hilarious).



The sexual harassment and outmoded dating advice don't age quite as well, and part of my love for this book is definitely nostalgic, but I still really enjoyed being in Bridget's head. Her anxiety/neuroticism really mirrored my own in my teens/early 20s. I honestly feel a little embarrassed thinking about how much I obsessed over boys sometimes when I was younger. I still have my journals from my early teens and oh my god, I forgot how I could spent hours parsing through every single interaction for secret clues. I'm not sure this book will be quite as appealing to teens and young women now but if you're interested in some fun 90s references and a pretty well-rounded heroine (that also serves as a pretty decent homage to PRIDE AND PREJUDICE), you should definitely check out this book.



3.5 stars

Took a little trip back to 1996 to visit my old pal Bridget Jones. I have seen the movie countless times, but this was the first time I’ve had the pleasure of reading the book. Gotta hand it to Renée Zellweger, she absolutely crushed this role and perfectly portrayed this quirky mess of a character. I do think she added a softness to a character who feels a little more crass and brash on the page, but otherwise, the reading experience felt very similar.

Many aspects of the book were noticeably outdated and so very 90s, but the interpersonal struggles portrayed felt largely the same. Bridget is a 30 something single female feeling the pressure from her family, society and her own desires to meet someone and “settle down.” I loved how the author depicted how these struggles are exacerbated around the holidays. Unfortunately, I think this is just as true today and is a reality that may remain timeless. The spirit of comparison seems to walk hand in hand with the holiday season. I thought this quote in particular was so profound and still accurately sums up today’s culture.

“The whole bloody world's got a commitment problem. It's the three-minute culture. It's a global attention-span deficit.”

This was a quirky cast of characters and there’s no denying that many of their issues were worsened by their own poor choices. Gotta wonder how much they resembled the population at the time. I hope for the sake of their lungs that smoking wasn’t that prevalent, but I have a feeling that’s not too far off the mark.

I also really felt for her poor dad. There are too sides to every story and I think it’s likely he took his wife for granted in more ways than one, but he seemed so sweet and blindsided by his wife’s actions. This line in particular really hit me in my feels. “When someone loves you it's like having a blanket all around your heart.” In the book he is inferring that the blanket has been taken away.

It’s been a long time since I saw the movie, so it was lovely to meet her again. The diary entries were entertaining, but in the book it got a bit repetitive. I got fed up about reading about calories and cigarettes. But I still enjoyed the book and her antics.

'I got in the lift to go out for a sandwich and found Daniel in there with Simon from Marketing, talking about footballers being arrested for throwing matches. 'Have you heard about this, Bridget?' said Daniel.
'Oh yes,' I lied, groping for an opinion. 'Actually, I think it's all rather petty. I know it's a thuggish way to behave, but as long as they didn't actually set light to anyone I don't see what all the fuss is about.'
Simon looked at me as if I was mad and Daniel stared for a moment and then burst out laughing.'

One of my favourite quotes and, I think, fairly representative.

I am surprised I never left a review of this book!
I must have been less than 20 when I first read it, and my emotion was roaring love. I saw myself on every page and recognized the difficulty of losing weight while consuming hefty amounts of alcohol, as well as all the disappointments of the dating world.

Then I read it when I was somewhere around 30 and I was shocked: what? She's thirty-s0mething? I was by then a mother and probably a boss and Bridget seemed too infantile and irresponsible for her age to even be funny. Yeah, I guess I was a bit stuck-ap at that age (also, thin, and didn't consume hefty amounts of alcohol).

I am turning 40 this year, - gleefully, though prematurely, transitioning from Mother into Crone, - and I was looking for a funny book my husband and I could read aloud to each other in turns, and this seemed a natural choice because of the diary format.
What can I say now, then?
Firstly, it goes wonderfully well with cava and takuan.
Secondly, it's funny.
It gets a little bit too predictable by the middle of the book. Everybody is less loveable than they are in the film (and Salman Rushdie and Lord Archer aren't even there). It's also full of dated pop-culture references. But it's light and breezy and warm, and it's an excellent choice for reading aloud: this book is about the value of community, so it makes total sense to enjoy it with others.

(It has just occurred to me that I can see something in common between my daughter and Bridget now, in that they both perform actions that seem reasonable to themselves, but are often unpleasantly surprised by the consequences).

I hate to admit that I like the film better, but it does have a lovely soundtrack; but I'm grateful to the book for the pleasant evenings.
I wonder what I'll make of it in the next decade, if I get the chance to read it.

Gawd, this book was criminally hilarious. I sat in the doctor's office waiting room literally snorting into my Nine West handbag (there's something really metal about being a minimum wage worker who chooses to buy labels instead of food) as I cradled my Kobo in my lap, with Bridget Jones and her life of ridiculous shenanigans all over the black and white screen. Needless to say, the people I waited with were unimpressed. They are probably not the first to wonder why someone like me would carry anything as elegant as Nine West.

Sometimes I wonder that, too.

Honestly? I took off a star because I was highly disappointed with the rushed and nonsensical ending. But the rest of this book? Pure gold. A little warning, though: this is not a shiny, polished tale of the stereotypical (and in real life, extremely rare) uptown and sophisticated south-English thirtysomething. It's an incredibly and often shamefully honest portrayal of a woman who likes sex and cigarettes and drinking and her foul-mouthed friends. It's not The Young Victoria. It's modern Britain, like nobody wants to see it.

Sure, it's a little ham-fisted in places. I won't say it doesn't idealize relationships, and get a little bizarre here and there. But who cares? I picked this book up expecting to be entertained. It exceeded those expectations.

Good job, Helen Fielding.

I put off writing this review because I knew it was just going to end up being an angry rant and I didn't want to offend anyone that loved this book, but the time has come. I now warn those who loved the book to, please, either look away now or read ahead with caution. No offense is meant at all to people who enjoyed this book.

I will start by saying that I had seen the movie before reading the book. I've seen the movie quite a few times (the second one only once or twice). It's the kind of movie that I enjoy enough that if I happen to spot it on TV, I will sit and watch it quite happily. It's never been a movie that I've gone out of my way to watch or one that I would sit there and suddenly think 'I know, I'll stick that on' but I do enjoy it when I watch it as a nice, cutesy, light movie. So I decided to give the book a try and see if I'd enjoy it even more. Well, that didn't happen. Every single character is more likable in the movie than in the book. Every single one of them. I've never been that fond of Renee Zellweger in the role but even she was more likable than book Bridget, and the effortless combined charm of Hugh Grant and Colin Firth make both male suitors much more attractive and make it easier for us to understand why Bridget would actually go for either of them because just in writing, both men are incredibly unappealing.

Mark Darcy has his good moments and I will admit to their being a few moments where I thought 'aaww he's quite sweet' but it never went beyond that and for most of the book (basically the whole book) he was such a wet fish and unfortunately an incredibly dull character. He didn't do anything. He stood up for Bridget, maybe, twice in the whole book and besides that he just stood by silently and did what everyone else told him he should do. He was barely even in the book for the most part which just made him getting together with Bridget seem so random and rushed at the end.

Daniel Cleaver is just the worst. I mean, I know he's supposed to be because he's supposed to be the worst human being ever so that we root for boring old Mark Darcy but still. It was almost over the top with just how horrible he was the whole time. I understand that, yes, sometimes women do unfortunately fall for horrible guys and can't help it but while I was reading it I just could not for the life of me ever work out why Bridget liked him so much and let him treat her like such crap.

Onto Bridget herself, oh god. Where do I even start? Actually let's start with the whole weight thing because this really pissed me off. First of all, there were several times when she would be about 9 stone and would complain about being 'basically obese'. Erm, I'm sorry, what?! 9 stone is not obese, it's not even close. If a girl who is overweight (and weighs more than 9 stone) reads this book and sees Bridget moaning about being 9 stone and complaining about how 'gross' and 'fat' she is, how would that then make them feel? But it doesn't stop there because when Bridget finally does lose some weight and drop a stone, her friends (who are all horrible) tell her she looks tired and unhealthy. Secondly, I don't mind someone complaining about not being able to lose weight when it's obvious that they're making a genuine effort to or when there's a genuine reason as to why they're unable to or struggling to but when someone moans about being "overweight" and says they want to lose weight but then immediately eats loads of chocolate or goes out binge drinking it is the most frustrating thing to read or listen to ever. Why should I feel any sympathy for someone who just complains all the time but doesn't actually do anything to help themselves? She also complains about wanting to cut down on her drinking and give up smoking, and does she do either of those? No, of course she doesn't, she just continues moaning about it. Bridget is the stereotypical idea of what single women are like, and it's incredibly offensive.

Bridget and her friends are also one of the worst group of friends ever. One of their friends is with some guy that they all hate, and for good reason because he's horrible to their friend and treats her poorly, so what do they do? Nothing. According to Bridget herself, after one of the first break ups their friend had with the guy, Sharon and Bridget told her how much they hated him and that she shouldn't be with him and then the friend got back together with him and told him everything they said. First of all, this shows how horrible all her friends are, even the one being screwed over by the guy then screws her friends over to him, and secondly Bridget and Sharon now use that as their excuse to just blatantly lie to their friends face and support her decision to get back with him whenever she gets dumped by him. These are not true friends. This is far from the only example. Every one of Bridget's friends are horrible, selfish, and self-centred people.

Then we get onto the topic of Bridget and her parents. Well, from the start it's clearly evident that Bridget has a favourite and her favourite is her Dad because her Mum is basically the typical cartoon, cheesy sit-com, bitch of a mother who always puts her daughter down or forces her to do things she doesn't want to do like talk to people. This favouritism is fine to start with because you have already been shown Bridget's point of view and you kind of understand it because the Dad is shown as the sweet, caring type of Dad. The favouritism becomes more annoying however when Bridget's Mum decides to leave her Dad. The Mum gives her reasons which are actually very sound, solid, good reasons for having had enough and wanting a divorce (the Dad retired years ago and now does absolutely nothing but he expects her to continue her role as happy housewife and do everything for him and she wants to go out and get a job of her own as she's never had one) but suddenly, "feminist" and "pro-singleton", Bridget doesn't accept those reasons and still sides with the Dad who completely fails to see how he could be in any way at fault for how the Mum feels.

[Edit] I initially gave this two stars, as I guess I was feeling generous (I had just come back from holiday, maybe that influenced it) but after leaving it for a while and then thinking about it again, I'm going to have to stick to my guns and give it one star. I did not enjoy this book at all. I spent most of it just feeling so angry at everyone and everything in it. It had some stupid plotlines thrown in out of nowhere (yes, I'm looking at the Mum and her money laundering boyfriend) which just frustrated me more. Some of the book was (I guess sadly in some cases) very realistic. As much as I hated the characters, they did all feel very real and I know that I have definitely known people like some of them in my life. Some parts of the book were also very relatable, as a singleton that has been single for a long time I can definitely say that I've had a lot of the same comments and conversations that Bridget has in the book with various people. How realistic and, sometimes, relatable the book can be/is, is what made me initially give it 2 stars instead of 1 but even with those moments, I still had a bad time reading this book. The main parts I did somewhat enjoy were whenever Bridget was actually having one of her moments of not caring and enjoying being single and throwing it back in people's faces when they tried to talk down to her for it, as that is the way I wish more single women were portrayed in the media as opposed to the sad, desperate women who can't cope or function without a man that they are usually shown to be (i.e. like Bridget through most of the book). So this book wasn't completely without redeeming moments but for the most part I just found this book incredibly hard to swallow. I was looking for a nice, relaxing, funny, holiday read and I didn't get any of those from this book. Obviously other people do enjoy this book and it's sequels so it was clearly just the wrong book for me. The hotel I was staying at had a double sided bookshelf where people could take or leave a book so I left this one there, hopefully it will find it's way into the hands of someone who will enjoy it a lot more than I did.

I love Bridget Jones with my whole heart. I want to live in her head forever. She is fantastic, fearless, and funny. She sees the humour in every tragic situation. She understands every neurotic thought I've ever had. She is my spirit animal.

Bridget Jones has always been one of my favourite movies and so I put off reading the book for a long time because I figured it would be more or less the same but it's actually totally wonderful in its own way.

I think you have to have been through certain things to really enjoy this book. If you can't relate to Bridget, you must be very lucky indeed. In a way, she is a bit intolerable, in a lovable sort of way. She guzzles wine, smokes countless cigarettes, and gorges on food like it's the last time she'll ever get to eat, and then wails endlessly about her weight; she moans about her dead-end job (in publishing, which I always thought would be so glamorous) without ever trying to get ahead; and she mopes about her social life and single status while remaining surrounded by her completely vapid (though all individually endearing) friends, and dating the absolute worst kind of men. This is something I experienced for several years (luckily in my early twenties - poor Bridge is still struggling into her thirties) and I wasn't even half as good as dealing with it as her. I was actually intolerable. Not at all adorable or witty or good-natured like she is.

This book is about growing up while trying to maintain sane with a cool, calm, and collected outer appearance. It's about learning to take your life seriously while trying not to take your life too seriously. It is heart-warming and laugh-out-loud funny and a complete narrative of my early twenties. It's to be taken lightheartedly, and if you can do that, I think you'll find it incredibly enjoyable.

5 stars

Goodreads description: Meet Bridget Jones—a 30-something Singleton who is certain she would have all the answers if she could:
a. lose 7 pounds
b. stop smoking
c. develop Inner Poise

"123 lbs. (how is it possible to put on 4 pounds in the middle of the night? Could flesh have somehow solidified becoming denser and heavier? Repulsive, horrifying notion), alcohol units 4 (excellent), cigarettes 21 (poor but will give up totally tomorrow), number of correct lottery numbers 2 (better, but nevertheless useless)..."

Bridget Jones' Diary is the devastatingly self-aware, laugh-out-loud daily chronicle of Bridget's permanent, doomed quest for self-improvement — a year in which she resolves to: reduce the circumference of each thigh by 1.5 inches, visit the gym three times a week not just to buy a sandwich, form a functional relationship with a responsible adult, and learn to program the VCR.

Over the course of the year, Bridget loses a total of 72 pounds but gains a total of 74. She remains, however, optimistic. Through it all, Bridget will have you helpless with laughter, and — like millions of readers the world round — you'll find yourself shouting, "Bridget Jones is me!"

This was amazing!

I love British books (I mean I loved the ones I read lol) because they're humor is so unique. It literally made me laugh out loud more than a few times.

I loved this book also because I watched the movie and it was as funny as the book so I just decided to read it. Its ratings are meh but I suggest you give it a try and not look at what everyone else is saying because everyone is different and you might end up liking it!

Bridget Jones is the funniest person in the world. And that's because she's not perfect, she has her flaws and as small as they seem to us they make her very anxious and paranoid. And I think that every one of us is like that.

I could relate to her, even though I'm way younger and tbh my life isn't that exciting, mostly because the book is so unbelievable yet very realistic.

But, I liked it mostly for its humor. The scene that is funniest to me both in the movie and the book is when she slides down the fireman pole. My cheeks hurt because of how much I laughed.

I liked that it was written in a form of a diary and not as a usual novel because something different is usually a fun thing. I love books like that and it reminded me a bit of Confessions of Georgia Nicolson series by Louise Rennison (Oh, she's a British writer, too!), a book series that I absolutely adore.

I'm definitely gonna be reading the second book because I need more of Bridget Jones.

This book is very light, funny and fast-paced. I read it in a very quick time because it was so interesting (but also it's not too long, so...). I recommend it to everyone out there even if you don't like chick-lit and romance because I bet y'all love a good comedy. All in one, a perfect book for summer!

I usually end up liking the books better than their film counterparts, but it worked the other way around for Bridget Jones's Diary for me.

While I loved the movie, this book was just a bit blah. Bridget irritated me with her whining and her desperation for a man. I hope that I won't be anything like that by the time that I'm nearing the big 3-0. The diary format of the writing annoyed me, but that might just be because I prefer books that are descriptive and have wonderful narrative.

Daniel Cleaver also came off as a one-dimensional, total bastard type instead of like the irresistible, though still a bastard, charmer that Hugh Grant portrayed him to be in the movie version.

I guess it was an okay short, meaningless read, though. If it had been any longer than it was, I don't think I'd have managed to plod through it.

This certainly wasn't a novel but, what's worse, it wasn't even a credible diary. Who records their mishaps while cooking and running late in their preparations? Perhaps if this were written in the phone-texting age, I could imagine someone constantly chronicling their every move, no matter how pressing the situation or how inane and empty the commentary, but as it is, this book serves as a frightening precursor to a new generation of books with no established atmosphere, characters, dialogue, or insight. Fielding would be better off looking into a crystal ball and telling people their fortunes than writing another non-novel.

Obwohl dieses Buch schon 20 Jahre alt ist, konnte es mich echt begeistern! Mit sehr viel Witz, Realität und Sarkasmus konnte es mich für sich gewinnen. Die Story ist sehr nahe am Buch, was ich gut fand, da ich zuerst den Film gesehen habe. Super Buch für Single Ladies, die auch mal über sich selbst lachen können. Girlpower! ;)