In this time of Netflix and podcasts, the overused marketing line ‘the book everyone’s talking about’ has taken on a parodical status. Not that many people are talking about books. Fewer still are all talking about the same one. But ten years ago, I was involved in a book that everyone did talk about.
Back in February 2012, when I was a newly minted marketing executive at Random House, I was asked into a meeting to discuss the potential acquisition of a self-published trilogy of erotic novels that started life as Twilight-inspired fan fiction.
Initially, I wasn’t convinced. There were so many things about Fifty Shades of Grey that made it feel like a book we could never sell. The reply to my various concerns was brief: ‘It’s sold 100,000 copies already.’
These were numbers that most publishers would dream about – for a book that, in the ordinary course of events, no one would’ve dreamt about publishing. But this was no ordinary course of events.
Fifty Shades of Grey was circumventing the acquisitions process from day one. There were no manuscripts and sales meetings for E. L. James. Instead, everything was done at what constituted breakneck speed for the book world, as we looked to get her away from self-publishing and into the traditional model immediately.
‘Gail’s very keen,’ my manager said, referring to the Random House CEO at the time. ‘It looks like the US are publishing it and they want us to go at the same time.’
Which is exactly what we did. The trilogy was acquired and we committed to repackaging, editing, printing and publishing within six weeks. To give you an idea of timescale, this process usually takes a year for most books. Sometimes two.
The compressed schedule meant packing a lot in post-acquisition. We were trying to create some sort of buzz around it and convince supermarkets to dedicate significant amounts of shelf space to erotic fiction – something the Asda buyers were particularly hesitant about.
