Fifty Shades of Grey author E L James releases cover of steamy sequel to her ‘modern-day Cinderella’ novel about a ‘spare’ aristocrat and a secretive piano player
- The Missus will be published in June 2023, 4 years after The Mister was released
- It follows the story of an aristocrat and a piano prodigy who fall in love
The bestselling author of Fifty Shades of Grey has revealed the cover of her new book, described as a ‘passionate love story’.
E L James, who penned the steamy trilogy, will release The Missus on 20 June this year, which follows on from Sunday Times bestseller The Mister.
The cover depicts a picturesque and tranquil lake scene on which two swans are standing side-by-side.
Eager fans of the erotic author will have had a four-year wait for the second instalment in the series, after The Mister was published in April 2019.
According to publisher Century, The Missus will tell a tale of ‘romance interrelationship and a love that transcends all obstacles’.
The cover for E L James’s new novel The Missus, which follows on from The Mister published in April 2019, has been released
The first book in James’s new series followed aristocrat Maxim Trevelyan, a ‘spare’ figure who becomes an earl after his brother suddenly dies.
Readers are introduced to Trevelyan as he meets Alessia Demachi, an Albanian national who is hiding a secret. The pair then navigate an intense romantic connection despite being from different worlds in what has been described as a ‘modern take on Cinderella’.
The raunchy novel was picked up by Universal for a film adaptation in 2020, after the storming success of the company’s $1 billion Fifty Shades of Grey box office trilogy.
The Mister landed on the New York Times bestseller list for nine weeks after its publication in April, and it has been sold in 33 international territories.
The Mister, which was published in April 2019, tells the story of an aristocrat and a young piano prodigy who fall in love against the odds
E L James, the bestselling author of the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy, has written the second instalment in her ‘modern-day Cinderella’ story
However, the novel was panned by many literary critics, with The Guardian remarking that James, ‘swaps BDSM for dispiritingly creepy power games.’
James will serve as a producer on the adaptation, as she did with her three Fifty Shades movies, though there is no one attached to write and direct yet.
James’ Fifty Shades trilogy – Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed – were the top three best selling books of the past decade, and were all turned into films by Universal Pictures.
In the plot of The Mister, piano prodigy Alessia fights to protect herself from sex traffickers who smuggled her out of Albania and into the UK.
As she becomes entangled with Maxim, who becomes increasingly more protective of her, the novel ends on a cliffhanger with readers left waiting to find out if the aristocrat will pop the question.
Speaking about The Mister in 2019, James said: ‘This (book) is about two people finding each other and trying to maintain a relationship when there’s so many things against them.’
Selina Walker of Century said: ‘It is such a pleasure and a privilege to be working with Erika again.
‘The Missus is a totally gripping love-story between two people who are clearly destined to be together but still need to work out how to reconcile their very different backgrounds.
‘It is passionate and intense and rich in characterisation and themes, and I envy everyone who has yet to read it!’
***
Read more at DailyMail.co.uk