11 Things You Didn't Know About 'Fifty Shades Of Grey'

Today marks the release of 'Grey', the fourth book in EL James' super sexy saga detailing the torrid love affair between millionaire BDSM enthusiast Christian Grey and innocent, virginal Anastasia Steele.

With the first three books taking the world by storm since their release in 2011, we took a look at the wonderful world of 'Fifty Shades'.

1.    The first book in the trilogy, ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ has sold over 100 million copies around the world.

2.    ‘Grey’ has broken pre-order records in bookshops around the world and was the number one Kindle pre-order of 2015 on Amazon.

3.    Author E.L James earned £65million between June 2012 and June 2013, making her the world’s richest author that year.

4.    The 2015 film adaptation of ‘Fifty Shades’ made $569.7 million (£358m) at the box office when it was released on Valentine’s Day this year. Unsurprisingly, both sequels have already been given the green light.

5.    Oscar-nominee Felicity Jones was an early frontrunner for the role of Anastasia Steele but ultimately director Sam Taylor-Johnson chose relative newcomer Dakota Johnson to take on the lead role.

6.    Ryan Gosling and Garrett Hedlund both turned down the role of Christian Grey. Englishman Charlie Hunam was cast opposite Dakota but pulled out due to scheduling conflicts. In the end, former Calvin Klein model turned actor Jamie Dornan won the role and the rest is history.

7.    In the books, multi-millionaire Grey lives in a penthouse apartment in Seattle’s Escala building. Uber fans will be please to hear that it's a real building and for a mere £3.7million you can buy an apartment there and live out your very own ‘Fifty Shades’ fantasy.

8.    There have been some seriously dodgy attempts to jump on the back of the ‘Fifty Shades’ phenomenon. Among nail varnishes, teddy bears and board games, the stand out press release came from Dulux. Here’s their version of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’. Genius.

9.    Lead actors Dakota and Jamie admitted their friends and family probably wouldn’t be watching them strip off on the big screen. Dornan had these adorable words to say about his wife of two years, Amelia Warner.

10.    Despite pulling in an eye-watering amount at the box office, Jamie and Dakota earned just $250,000 (£157,000) for the first movies. Sources claim they are in talks to negotiate seven-figure salaries for the sequels. It’s even been claimed that Jamie has been offered a cool $1.5million (£943,000) bonus to go full frontal!

11.    Critics of the books lambasted James’ writing style, with many losing patience with narrator Ana’s constant reference to her ‘inner goddess’. For the record, her inner goddess appears 52 times in the first book.

Will you be reading 'Grey'? Let us know what you thought of it!

[Fifty Shades: Meet The Real Life Christian Grey]

[Jamie Dornan's Wife Steals The Show At Fifty Shades Premiere]