‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ trilogy tops 100 million in worldwide sales

This week the erotic “Fifty Shades of Grey” trilogy reached a huge milestone: It sold more than 100 million copies worldwide. Forty-five million of those books were bought by readers in the U.S.

The 100-million mark puts E.L. James’ bestselling series on par with Ian Fleming’s James Bond series. But the first Bond book, “Casino Royale,” was published more than 50 years ago; “Fifty Shades of Grey” debuted in 2011.

Originally self-published, “Fifty Shades of Grey” gained even wider reach after being picked up by Vintage, an imprint of Random House, in 2012.

In a release, Vintage notes that two copies of the trilogy sold every second during its peak sales period. It’s the fastest selling book series in the history of Random House, the world’s largest publisher.

The trilogy, which includes the books “Fifty Shades Darker” and “Fifty Shades Freed,” has been published in 51 languages, including Icelandic, Hebrew, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Mongolian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak and Thai.

If sales continue to climb, the “Fifty Shades of Grey” series may reach the sales of Stephenie Meyer’s “Twilight” (120 million) but it will take continued enthusiasm to reach Dan Brown’s Robert Langdon series that began with “The DaVinci Code” (200 million). J.K. Rowling is even further off -- her boy wizard Harry Potter has sold 450 million books.

A film adaptation of “Fifty Shades of Grey” is in the works, slated for release in February 2015.

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