A pre-publication excerpt of the highly anticipated next Bridget Jones novel, "Mad About the Boy," reveals a plot twist that has left fans all over the world in shock. Mark Darcy, aka the love of Bridget's life, will be killed off in the saga's highly anticipated third novel, Bridget Jones's Diary, Mad About The Boy, which will be published on Oct. 10 in the UK and Oct. 15 in the US. Extracts of the book were published in the Sunday Times Magazine, revealing that Bridget is now 51, with two small children called Mabel and Billy, and a "toy-boy" boyfriend called Roxster. The cause of Darcy's death is shown in a flashback in the book, and will not be revealed in advance.
The book takes off five years after Darcy's death, in which the famously unlucky-in-love heroine finds herself back in the singles market. Helen Fielding first introduced heroine Bridget Jones in 1996 with her best-selling "Bridget Jones's Diary," a cheeky look at a 30-something single woman's adventures with life and love in London. In the first book, Bridget gets to know the prickly but sweet Mark Darcy, and in the follow-up, 1999's "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason," he proposes. In the movie adaptations, the main characters of Bridget and Mark were famously portrayed by Renee Zellweger and Colin Firth.
Fielding said when the new novel was announced that Bridget would be in a different place with "Mad About the Boy." "My life has moved on and Bridget's will move on, too," the author said in February. "I hope people will have as much fun reading it, as I am writing it." However, with the news that Darcy is dead, many fans have taken it to social media to express their mixed feelings. "Gutted about Mark Darcy. I can't face a world with no happily ever after for Mark and Bridget!" Tweeted one user. Another one posted, "Mark Darcy has died in the new Bridget Jones, there is now no point to life," "Why the f*** would you kill mark darcy oh my god this is the worst news ever," while a third one said, "I don't want to live in a world where Mark Darcy and Bridget Jones aren't living happily ever after. Too far, Helen Fielding. Too far."
Nevertheless, some book critics think this was the best thing to do, because no one would like a story about the perfect married life of Bridget and Mark because it would get boring. The Bookseller's Cathy Rentzenbrink said the book is fabulous. "It makes perfect sense for Bridget to be a widow. She can't be happily married, happy marriage doesn't work in fiction because it doesn't sustain a narrative drive. I'm not interested in reading about Bridget and Mark Darcy arguing over whose responsibility it is to get the car MOT'd or working out that the dishwasher isn't broken, they just need to put some Rinse Aid in it... And unhappily married? Do we want an adulterous Bridget? Or a Bridget who self-medicates with chocolate and gin while Mark Darcy is off philandering with someone with whom he doesn't have to discuss MOTs or dishwashers?"
As for the character Daniel Cleaver, played by Hugh Grant in the film versions, he is also mentioned in the extract as a "naughty godfather" to Mabel and Billy, "relied upon for emergency babysitting duties and inappropriate sexual advances towards their mother."
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