Books: Beyond Bridget Jones

Three new novels dig deeper into single life

Aside from the suburban teenager as represented by James Van Der Beek, is there a subject of greater cultural fascination at the moment than the young, single career woman yearning to a Joni Mitchell ballad in her mind? She has certainly claimed her place on television, and soon Barnes and Noble will need to create extra room for her, perhaps with a books-about-thirtyish-media- women-who-fret-and-drink-Scotch-in-New-York-or-California section. In the year since Helen Fielding's best-selling Bridget Jones's Diary, a novel focused on a cocktails-and-cellulite-obsessed London editor, writers have continued to weigh in on how single women do, and should, comport themselves.

Earlier this year...

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