Arnoldo Mondadori Editore around the world, of which around 300,000 in Italy, with the aim of supporting the process of growth in digital for books. In 2012 Mondadori publishes Fifty Shades of Grey, the first volume of the erotic trilogy by debut London author E L James, rapidly followed by the two other titles, Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed. The trilogy sees in Italy the same kind of unprecedented success it gained in the English-language world: with more than 3.3 million copies sold in Italy and 130,000 downloads of the electronic version, the three volumes reach first, third and fourth position
Fifty Shades of Grey and repeatedly with asinine phrases", and described it as "depressing". The book garnered some accolades. In December 2012, it won both "Popular Fiction" and "Book of the Year" categories in the UK National Book Awards. In that same month, "Publishers Weekly" named E. L. James the 'Publishing Person of the Year', a decision whose criticism in the "LA Times" and the "New York Daily News" was referred to by and summarised in "The Christian Science Monitor". Earlier, in April 2012, when E. L. James was listed as one of "Time" magazine's "100 Most Influential People in the World", Richard Lawson