Helen Fielding

Helen Fielding (1958) is an English writer best known for her novels about Bridget Jones – a single woman in London at about 30, trying to make sense of her personal and love life. Fielding's famous book “Bridget Jones' Diary” began its life as an anonymous column in “The Independent” in 1995. In the next year it was released as a novel, followed by a sequel in 1999 called “Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason”. The two novels have been published in forty countries and sold over fifteen million copies. In 2001 and 2004 both of them were also adapted into films (under the same titles as the books) and have achieved worldwide success. The original Bridget Jones was inspired by Jane Austen's novels - “Pride and Prejudice” and “Persuasion”.

Before starting to write about Bridget Jones, Helen Fielding published her first novel - “Cause Celeb” (1994) which was not very successful. In 2003 the fifth book of Fielding - “Olivia Joules and The Overactive Imagination”, was published. It is a light-hearted spy thriller which is set in Miami, Los Angeles, England and the Sudan.

With her novels about Bridget Jones Helen Fielding has become one of the leading authors of the literary genre known as chick lit.