‘Fifty Shades Of Grey’ Hardcover 10th Anniversary Edition To Be Published In April

2022 marks the 10-year anniversary of the traditional publishing release of Fifty Shades of Grey by E L James, a pseudonym for Erika Leonard. The BDSM-themed erotic romance was the first in a bestselling trilogy featuring kinky billionaire protagonist Christian Grey and college student Anastasia Steele.

To mark the occasion, Bloom Books, a Sourcebooks imprint for women authors, which launched in spring 2021 by publishing James’s backlist, will publish a hardcover anniversary edition of Fifty Shades of Grey on April 5. The anniversary edition, which retails for $31.99, will have a limited print run of 20,000 copies and be sold in bookstores and online. Limited quantities of signed books will be sold via Premiere Collectibles and Barnes & Noble’s website. Reissued hardcover editions of the following two titles in the trilogy, Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed, will be published by Bloom Books in August and October respectively.

Fifty Shades of Grey, originally written as Twilight fan fiction, was first published in 2011 in ebook and print-on-demand editions by Australian publisher The Writers Coffee Shop, before being reissued by Vintage Books in 2012. Vintage Books is an imprint of Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, whose parent company is Penguin Random House.

Fifty Shades of Grey went on to spend 133 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and become the bestselling book of the decades, with the trilogy appearing on PBS’s The Great American Read’s list of America’s 100 most-loved books. The trilogy spawned three movies and its success and reader interest prompted James to write three additional novels, alternative tellings told from protagonist Christian Grey’s point of view, Grey, Darker and Freed. I interviewed James as well as Dominique Raccah, Publisher and CEO of Sourcebooks, and Christa Désir, Editor, Bloom Books and Sourcebooks Casablanca, via email to learn more about the process of creating the anniversary editions.

Asked why Bloom Books decided to rerelease the popular erotic romance novel, Raccah said, “Fifty Shades of Grey is one of the most important novels of all time. It changed lives. It inspired millions of readers to pick up a book, start reading, and share their love of the story with their friends, family, and neighbors. It inspired readers who hadn’t picked up a book in years to develop a passion for romance and romantic fiction. It saved marriages and started love affairs. It inspired creative souls to begin telling their own stories and was the genesis for other writing careers.”

From the initial idea for the hardcover editions to the public announcement on James’s social media feeds in early April took six months. Raccah said of the cover design process that while the publisher’s art director and content delivery department were involved, the cover, end papers and overall design of the anniversary edition were “sparked by the author’s own imagination.” Raccah said James has “always had an instinctive grasp of what makes an eye-catching cover; this was no different.”

While the original cover featured an image of a tie and only alluded to the explicitly kinky content inside, the new cover features a flogger. The new edition will have a navy linen matte cover with silver foil plus navy-stained edges and custom end sheets. Of the update, Pamela Jaffee, Senior Director, Publicity and Brand Marketing, Bloom Books and Sourcebooks Casablanca, said, “The original cover designs were intended as mysterious – almost coded – references to the trilogy’s provocative content. Ten years later, with 165 million books sold worldwide there’s no longer any mystery! We wanted something elegant and simple that reflected the trilogy and Erika decided to feature a flogger, rather than a tie – but in a style that subtly references Christian Grey’s assertion that he ‘doesn’t do hearts and flowers.’”

The anniversary edition has a new foreword by James “as well as an extra bit of fun content at the end of the book,” said Désir.

Asked how the success of Fifty Shades of Grey has changed her life, James said, “It’s hard to believe it’s been ten years! My life has been a whirlwind since then, and changed in too many ways to fathom – and it’s all thanks to the readers who picked up these books, loved them and recommended them to their friends and family. Has the last decade changed my writing? That’s for readers to say. All I know is, it’s finding the time to sit and think and write that is so rare and precious now.”

As for possible future E L James Bloom Books titles, Raccah said James “is filled with ideas, and we cannot wait to see what comes next!”