Interview

Anna Todd Opens Up About the Future of ‘After,’ Fanfiction Stigma & What’s Next

Anna Todd doesn’t believe in endings.

Ten years after publishing After, she’s not ready to write the final chapter for Hardin and Tessa. “I don’t know if any of my stories will ever end,” Todd told Swooon. “I feel like I’m the kind of person that I could write until they’re literally 95 and on their deathbed. Even with another series of mine, The Brightest Stars, it ended, but I left it open. I just can’t end a story.”

Readers have gravitated to the captivating and complicated love story between Hardin and Tessa, which started as Harry Styles fanfiction on Wattpad. After five books and five movies, Todd decided to write bonus chapters for the 10th anniversary edition of After, out now.

She debated how much extra content to write, and she’ll be the first to admit: “I don’t know when to stop.” The author recognized that readers had been asking about certain aspects of Hardin and Tessa’s love story over the years, and she wanted to give them those answers.

“I started it with letters from them because I mentioned in the original series that they were writing letters to each other,” she said. “I knew it would be fun for them to read the letters back and forth to each other. So I did that first, and then I went into straight chapters, but I still bounced around timeline-wise. I wanted to give a taste of all the parts. What happened during this, or how did they get to this at the end? I still left some stuff out on purpose for other reasons, but I did my best to fan-serve and give them what they wanted.”

At the end of the bonus chapters is the cryptic “to be continued.” The million-dollar question is: Is there another After book on the horizon? “I can’t answer that question,” she said with a smile. “I definitely did that on purpose. You’ll find out soon.”

Todd is one of many notable romance authors who started out in fanfiction and have found mainstream success. She acknowledged that the stigma around fanfiction isn’t completely gone, but it’s less potent after a decade.

Quantrell D. Colbert/ Aviron Pictures / Everett Collection

“Ten years ago, it was honestly kind of insulting,” the author admitted. “People were like, was this your fantasy? First of all, you would never ask the writer of Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings that, if this was his fantasy he’s living out. I’m a woman. That’s why you’re asking me that. I’m writing fiction. If you get it, you get it. If you don’t, you don’t.”

Today, the author embraces her fanfiction history and encourages other writers to dip into that space. “Just as a reader, there’s something so special about the passion you can feel when you’re reading someone’s fanfic because it’s not a contracted thing. They’re doing it purely out of love,” she noted. “Some of the best stuff I’ve ever read came from fanfic, and I’m so happy and so proud that the stigma has changed so much. Obviously, there’s still people that are like, that’s weird, or why would you do that? It’s like, why are you watching the 40th spinoff of a superhero movie? That is literally fanfiction of an original story.”

The 35-year-old continues to expand her resume beyond just books. She served as a producer on the film adaptations of After and After We Collided, which starred Hero Fiennes Tiffin and Josephine Langford as Hardin and Tessa. Now, with her production company Frayed Pages, she is producing the highly-anticipated adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s Regretting You, starring Allison Williams and Dave Franco.

Todd is staying right at home in the world of romance, of course, and buying the rights to other romance novels to bring them to life in a new way onscreen. She’s also already sold the film rights of another book she’s written — and the book’s not even out yet.

“It’s obviously romance. It’s definitely very different than anything I’ve ever written,” she said about her next novel. “It has a personal tie. It takes place in a European country, and I’m very excited. My goal is to make films with a bunch of different languages. So I’ll say that, and it’s spicy and fun and chaotic, and there’s a family storyline along with a love story.”

When Todd looks back on the decade since she published After, she’ll admit that times have changed. There are aspects of Hardin and Tessa’s story she would have done differently, “but at the same time, I’m still proud of these characters.” Their journey in After is the epitome of the “roller coaster of young love. They make so many mistakes.” And Todd loves messy.

As she thinks about the future, After is always at the forefront of her mind. She’s open to expanding that universe with more spinoffs. (She’s already released two Landon-centric books.)

“I feel like in my brain, I know every single character, even like a coworker at the publishing house or a barista. I know all their entire life story,” Todd told Swooon. “There are certain characters, I won’t say who exactly, that definitely have more rent and space in my head than others. I already know everything that happens to them until they’re older. I’m trying to balance overstaying the welcome and what people want.”

Just because her characters get the quintessential happy ending, it doesn’t mean their story is over. In Todd’s mind, it could be just the beginning.