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The Llamas don’t usually review fiction, but a novel that begins with a list of New Year’s resolutions is too appropriate to overlook. Bridget wants to lose weight, stop drinking so much, stop smoking, not allow her in-box to rage out of control, not spend more than she earns, not get up set over men, and eat more fiber. Her list is thorough and recognizable. We know there’s not a chance of success (without a trusty Palm running Life Balance) but Bridget tries — it is the story of her daily, messy, not quite thought-through attempts that inform the book and provide its abundant laugh-out-loud moments.
All by themselves Bridget’s daily statistics — of weight lost and gained, calories and cigarettes consumed, “alcohol units” drunk, and lottery tickets bought — are wickedly funny, and dreadfully familiar to anyone launching a diet or other self-improvement campaign. Bridget is a thirtyish “singleton” and her adventures in dating are obviously doomed to failure but her attempts at gourmet cooking are even more catastrophic. Following (almost) a fancy cookbook she ends up feeding her friends a meal of blue soup, omelet, and marmelade. Her cooking, indeed all of her efforts, are marked by wild and endearing optimism.
The diary form of the book can grow a little tiresome at times and some of the situations are extremely broad (she turns up at a “Tarts and Vicars” costume party and everyone else has predictably decided NOT to dress up) but it moves right along. Bridget, her friends, her impossible mother, her awful boyfriend and the hilariously gorgeous Mr. Darcy, the possibly not-awful boyfriend, are all vivid and witty characters. Bridget Jones’ Diary is entertaining, a lightweight book to be read straight through, and in spite of all the disasters (the “Tarts and Vicars” party is by no means the only outrageous event) it is a genuinely, even insanely cheerful and funny book. I understand there’s a movie out; I don’t know what that’s like but the book demanded to be read while dipping singlehandedly into a large bowl of heavily buttered popcorn.
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