“Fifty Shades Of Grey” author E.L. James has dropped from No. 1 in last year’s top earning authors’ ranking with $95 million to No. 11 – making just $10 million in this scoring period. In fact, FSOG sold just 1.8 million copies in 2013, compared to more than 29 million in 2012.!! But there is a film coming ….

Another author whose ranking has dropped  (third last year) is Suzanne Collins. She only earned $16 million this year– a 71% drop from the $55 million. Sales of the Hunger Games trilogy dropped 88%.

Danielle Steel, James Patterson and Stephen King –  amongst the world best selling authors for a long time – have younger competition. Three newcomers born after 1970 have made more than $9 million each last year -and two of them write young adult fiction, increasingly appealing to readers of all ages.

Young adult author Veronica Roth‘s ranks 6th for the “Divergent” trilogy which sold a combined 6.7 million copies in 2013, earning $17 million from print and ebook sales between June 2013 and June 2014. The book’s 2014 film adaption also helped. It grossed $270 million at the globally. At 26, she is the youngest newcomer on the ranking, and one of seven women on the 17-person list.

37-year-old John Green’s ”The Fault in Our Stars” made him around $9 million – you will probably know it’s a YA love story, which follows the trials of two cancer stricken teenagers. It’s sold well over 1 million copies in the U.S. and been turned into a film. Green is in joint 12th place with Gillian Flynn, who joins the rankings for the first time due to the continued success of 2012′s “Gone Girl”  a New York Times bestseller that sold 1.2 million copies in 2013, also now a film.

Market Research suggested 55% of YA books were bought by people 18 or over. Adults aged between 30 and 44 accounted for 28% of all YA sales, and the books are purchased for their own reading the vast majority of the time.

J.K. Rowling, the original young adult crossover, has earned $14 million and ranks 8th on the list. She continues to earn from back sales of Harry Potter 

James Patterson is at Number 1. He produces 14 books a year with the help of co-authors, and has sold more than 300 million copies since his 1976 debut. That’s $700 million in the last decade and $62 million in the last year!! Second ranked Dan Brown made an estimated $28 million from sales of his Robert Langdon thriller series. “Inferno” alone sold more than 1.4 million copies in the U.S. Third and fourth are Nora Roberts  – $23 million and Danielle Steel – $22 million. No 5 is Janet Evanovich on $20 million.