Anna started writing One Direction fan fiction on her iPhone. Now, she's sold over 15 million books.

In 2013, Anna Todd started writing a book. But not just any book. A fan fiction. Dedicated to One Direction. 

After centres around the life of quiet and nerdy (but breathtakingly beautiful) Tessa, who falls for the cold and calculated (but warm and sensitive) Harry. When he is dared by his friends to convince the nerd to give him her virginity, the two fall for each other. 

It's a... problematic story, but it was one Anna had fun writing. For five hours, every single day, she typed out the words on her iPhone to get a new chapter of After up on Wattpad – an online literature platform. 

Watch the movie trailer for After, the film based on Anna Todd's novel. Post continues after video. 

Within just one year, Anna had 1.5 billion reads and an entire multiverse under her belt. At the time, she was just 24 years old. 

In the book, she folded all the members of One Direction into her story – Zayn Malik was a "bad boy" and Niall and Louis were "punk". Liam played Tessa's squeaky-clean best friend. But the love interest, the man at the centre of the story, was Harry. 

While the story fast became the biggest story on Wattpad's platform, Anna was approached with the opportunity to officially publish her stories. 

"I thought it was someone messing with me," she recalled to Cosmo. "Then, when they emailed me from a Wattpad email, I was like, Oh! This is Wattpad. Like, OK, this is insane."

Anna Todd's After was a fan fiction based on One Direction. Image: Getty.

The only catch was that Anna would need to change the names of her main characters for legal reasons and so, Harry became Hardin. 

The then 25-year-old received multiple offers from different publishing houses in New York to turn her After novel into a series.

She signed on to Simon & Schuster for a three-book deal (for a confirmed six-figured paycheck) and the rights were sold in 23 countries – a deal considered extremely rare in the publishing world. 

"The idea of being published was such an abstract thing in the beginning. It wasn't even an option in my mind," Anna said. Visiting publishing houses in New York "was a total dream come true that I didn't even know I had".

Anna Todd with her first novel of the series, After. Image: Instagram @annatodd.

Criticism did follow when it became clear Anna had signed a lucrative book deal. A petition was created to remove the author from Wattpad and a Twitter hashtag – #SuspendAnnaTodd – spread like wildfire shortly after it was made. 

Their reasoning was simple: Attaching Harry Styles' name to a problematic one was wrong. 

"The people that love and support me, there’s so many of them," Anna said of the endless criticism. "There would be days when I would forget and be like, 'Everyone hates me!' But when I look at the big picture, most of the people – and not just with me, but in any fandom – they say things on Twitter and they don’t personally care."

After is one of the biggest erotica empires in the world. Image: Instagram @annatodd.

While One Direction has stayed relatively quiet about their thoughts on Anna's steamy fan fiction (which has since become an international bestseller), Todd says she "knows" Styles is aware of her book. 

"I know [Harry Styles] knows about it," she said in an online interview before refusing to delve deeper. 

The 'As It Was' singer was asked on SiriusXM’s The Howard Stern Show in May 2022 if the After series was actually about him and his former bandmates. 

"I don’t know how much… I don’t know," he said, according to clips that have been shared via TikTok. "I don’t really know. I don’t know if I can confirm. I’m not entirely educated on the origin of the script or anything. I’ve heard of it, yeah. But I don’t know in terms of… I’m not really sure."

Despite the confusion from the band, fans loved the series and in 2019, it was reported that 15 million of her books had been sold around the world. That number is made up of the five individual novels Anna has released, inspired by the Wattpad fan fiction that kick-started it all.

The series was also transformed into a movie, and in 2019 After premiered starring Hero Fiennes Tiffin as Hardin and Josephine Langford as Tessa. 

Hero Fiennes, Anna Todd and Josephine Langford, 2019. Image: Getty.

Since then, there are three more movies that have followed in its wake; 2020's After We Collided, 2021's After We Fell and 2022's After Ever Happy. The fifth instalment of the film, After Everything, has been confirmed for release in 2023.

While Hero doesn't believe he looks much like the character who inspired the creation of Hardin, he has admitted to meeting the One Direction star a few times.

Listen to this episode of Lowbrow, hosted by Holly Wainwright and Shannen Findlay. Post continues after audio. 

“I shook his hand, and there was a kind of thing," the actor told Style Caster in 2021. "We didn’t have the opportunity to talk because it was at the entrance, and it was quite full, but I feel like there was a little thing in the eyes of, like, we both knew. There was a knowing look. I haven’t spoken to him in detail about it. I hope that happens sometime."

He went into deeper detail in June 2022, where he mentioned how "drawn" he is to Styles. 

"He’s just insane. He’s so like, I don’t know – you’re kind of drawn to him, and he’s just such a great performer," Hero said to J-14. “I’m so grateful for Anna’s inspiration initially coming from him to lay down the line, bring me this opportunity. But I haven’t met him since. Only exchange we’ve had is a handshake and a knowing look. I think it was knowing, probably was. I don’t know, you’d have to ask him."

Feature Image: Getty/Instagram @annatodd.