In the United States, Fifty Shades of Grey was the top selling book of 2012.
More than 70 million copies of the trilogy (Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker, and Fifty Shades Freed) were sold in print, audio, and eBook formats in English, German, and Spanish. The information was made available by Bertelsmann, who owns trilogy publisher Random House. The books were sold between March and December 2012.
E.L. James’ Twilight fan fiction-turned-mommy porn was a runaway hit thanks to word of mouth and tons of media attention.
James and movie studio Universal are currently developing a book-to-film adaptation of Fifty Shades of Grey, which the studio hopes will be released next summer. Only a screenwriter, Kelly Marcel, has been selected so far. Naturally, fans are eager to see who will take the lead roles of Christian and Anastasia. Arrow star Stephen Amell announced last week he had taken a meeting for a role (presumably Christian Grey).
The book series’ sales numbers will continue to swell this year thanks to inevitable movie news and the just-released hardback versions of the books. The trilogy took an unconventional publishing route: It went from fan fiction to eBook to paperback to hardback. Typically books begin as hardbacks/eBooks then get released in paperback down the line.
Thanks, Speakeasy.
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