Bridget Jones; The Edge of Reason

New York: Viking Press, 2000. First American Edition [stated], First printing [stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. [12], 338, [2] pages. Autographed copy sticker on front of DJ. Signed on the title page. Helen Fielding (born 19 February 1958) is an English novelist and screenwriter, best known as the creator of the fictional character Bridget Jones, and a sequence of novels and films beginning with the life of a thirty something singleton in London trying to make sense of life and love. Bridget Jones's Diary (1996) and The Edge of Reason (1999) were published in 40 countries and sold more than 15 million copies. The two films of the same name achieved international success. In a survey conducted by The Guardian newspaper, Bridget Jones's Diary was named as one of the ten novels that best defined the 20th century. On 11 October 2016, and the publication of Fielding's sixth novel, Bridget Jones' Baby: the Diaries based on Fielding's original columns in The Independent newspaper on which the movie was based. In a 2004 poll for the BBC, Fielding was named the 29th most influential person in British culture. In December 2016, the BBC's Woman's Hour included Bridget Jones as one of the seven women who had most influenced British female culture over the last seven decades. She was approached by London's The Independent newspaper to write a column as herself and offered instead to create an imaginary, exaggerated, comic character. The column quickly acquired a following, her identity was revealed and her publishers asked her for a novel on Bridget Jones's Diary. The paperback went straight to the top of the bestseller chart and went on to become a worldwide bestseller. Bridget's second diary ushers in a reformed woman. She is no longer a smoker (well, not much), the wilderness years are over, and she is at last united with man-of-her-dreams Mark Darcy. But things aren't perfect: there's an eight-foot hole in the wall of her flat, she's increasingly worried about a certain boyfriend-stealing beauty, and her friends' mad advice is getting her nowhere - something has to change. And so Bridget decides to embark on a spiritual epiphany to the palm- and magic-mushroom-kissed shores of Thailand. Surely it will be the perfect place to set her life on course once and for all . . . Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason is Bridget at her best: funny, wise, and, as ever, a little bit sloshed. A number-one bestseller by Helen Fielding, it is, alongside Bridget Jones's Diary, a modern classic and one of the funniest books you'll ever read. Lurching from the cappuccino bars of Notting Hill to the blissed-out shores of Thailand, Bridget Jones searches for The Truth in spite of pathetically unevolved men, insane dating theories, and Smug Married advice ("'I'm just calling to say in the potty! In the potty! Well, do it in Daddy's hand, then!'"). She experiences a zeitgeist-esque Spiritual Epiphany somewhere between the pages of "How to Find the Love You Want Without Seeking It" ("can self-help books really self help?"), protective custody, and a lightly chilled Chardonnay.