Before motherhood, before marriage, Bridget Jones, with biological clock ticking very, very loudly, finds herself unexpectedly pregnant at the 11th hour. But which of her ex-boyfriends is the father? Mark Darcy: honorable, decent, notable human rights lawyer? Or the incorrigible Daniel Cleaver: charming, witty, notorious ladies’ man? In this tale of baby-deadline panic, maternal bliss, and social, professional, technological, culinary and childbirth chaos, Bridget navigates a pregnancy full of cheesy potatoes, outlandish advice from Smug Mothers, chaos at scans and childbirth classes, high jinks and romance.

Back in the day --- 17 years ago, to be exact --- Helen Fielding and her thirtysomething, potty-mouthed, diary-keeping singleton practically invented Chick Lit. There was a sequel in 1999, then nothing. Now our desperate, ditzy heroine is back, still obsessing over her weight and still looking for love.

Bridget Jones's Diary is the devastatingly self-aware, laugh-out-loud account of a year in the life of a thirty-something Singleton on a permanent doomed quest for self-improvement. Caught between the joys of Singleton fun, and the fear of dying alone and being found three weeks later half eaten by an Alsatian; tortured by Smug Married friends asking, "How's your love life" with lascivious, yet patronizing leers, Bridget 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. With a blend of flighty charm, existential gloom, and endearing self-deprecation, the diary has touched a raw nerve with millions of readers the world round. Read it, laugh and crash your head onto the table before you cry, "Bridget Jones is me!"