The Author of 'Bridget Jones's Diary' has horrified fans with the death of Bridget's Husband, Mark Darcy.

Helen Fielding returned to column writing with a shocking announcement.

The 55-year-old published an extract from her new book 'Mad About The Boy' in today's (Sept 29th) Sunday Times Magazine, and revealed that Jones is back as a 51 year-old mother of two but she also is a widow.

The extract informs Bridget fans that Mr Darcy, who was played by Colin Firth in the film adaptations, died five years earlier.

The column that depicted a 30 something year-old single women, living in London who fantasies about her boss whilst trying to make sense of her love life, connected with women everywhere and became hugely popular.

The last time fans were exposed to the accident prone singleton, she was being proposed to by Mark Darcy in his legal chambers to which she said "Yes". The love life of Jones finally made sense and was destined to live happily ever after.

15 years later and shock-horror, the successful barrister is dead and leaves behind two little sons for the widow to look after.

The third instalment will still maintain the same weight conscience, heavy smoking and wine drinking Bridget fans fell in love with back in 1995, when the column was first released. However this time she returns as a single mother and yet again leads a complicated love life with a young toyboy called 'Roxster'.

Fielding's publisher, Jonathan Cape, told The Guardian "the new book would "give a voice to the more mature social media-obsessed concerns of the women who grew up with Bridget", but fans were not pleased in the slightest.

The newspaper column turned into two bestselling novels for Fielding, published in 1996 and 1999, and eventually were adapted into Hollywood blockbuster films that starred Renee Zellweger as Bridget Jones, Colin Firth as Mark Darcy and Hugh Grant as her boss, Daniel Cleaver.

helen fielding
Helen Fielding shocked fans by killing off the charming 'Mark Darcy'

colin firth
Colin Firth portrayed Mark Darcy' in the Hollywood films