Whether you are a fan or not, you can’t escape the phenomenon craze of Fifty Shades of Grey. Because of that, we decided to list some of the top facts about Fifty Shades of Grey that you probably didn’t know about.
1. Oprah is one of the books biggest fans. She said, “I have downloaded all the Fifty Shades of Grey novels and for the first time I can take some guilty pleasure and just read. But I’m thinking, stop with the story, get to the juicy part.”
2. Harry Potter author JK Rowling actually refuses to read the book. She recently revealed she’d gone as far as to promise her editor she wouldn’t read it. And when asked if she feels left out of the current literary storm the Harry Potter author said: ‘Not wildly.’
3. It inspired a new line of baby clothes.
4. It also inspired a new burger called ‘The 15 Shades of Bacon Burger’ and is available at the Custom House.
5. The owner of the Damson Dene Hotel opted to replace all the bibles in the hotel nightstands with Fifty Shades of Grey.
6. There have been over 100 million copies of the book sold which is more than Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows and The Da Vinci Code.
7. The author E.L. James has never been to Seattle or Portland where the book is set. She actually used Google Street View to visualize the setting in her books.
8. Sales of duct tape, cable ties and rope at a hardware store skyrocketed after the books release in Pennsylvania thanks to the bondage scenes in the book.
9. The author, E.L. James’ real name is Erika Mitchell.
10. Another big celebrity fan is Harry Styles from One Direction. He says he reads the book to pick up additional bedroom tips.
11. The author writes her sex scenes to music. She said, “I have songs that I write the sex scenes to. One of them is the Black Eyed Peas song ‘Sexy’ That is a very sexual song.
12. Sex toy sales have went up drastically since the book came out. Sales of love beads or “smart or love balls” alone have went up 400% after Anastasia Steel enjoyed them in the book.
13. The movie rights were sold to Universal Pictures for $5 million dollars.
14. According to an online poll done last year, 44% of women prefer reading Fifty Shades of Grey to having real sex.
15. Anastasia Steele is being played by actress Dakota Johnson.
16. She is the daughter of actress Melanie Griffith and actor Don Johnson.
17. Christian Grey was originally supposed to be played by Charlie Hunnam from Son of Anarchy. He later dropped out of the project because Sons of Anarchy would have interfered with Fifty Shades of Grey. Eventually former underwear model Jamie Dornan was picked for the role.
18. The book has been labeled as “mommy porn” and “Twilight for Adults”.
19. E.L. James admits she wrote it as part of her midlife crisis.
20. The books were developed from a Twilight fanfiction, originally titled Master of the Universe. James removed her fan-fiction from the various websites after comments were made about the sexual content concerning characters Edward Cullen and Bella Swan After its removal, James rewrote and extended her story, making it an original trilogy.
