How to Read All of the “After” Books in Order
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Are you a book before the movie person, or more likely to get inspired to read the original material after seeing the film? Either way, there's a lot to delve into when it comes to Anna Todd's After book series. The first books in the young adult romance novel series were published in 2014 and two more soon followed. A few years after that, After was adapted in to a movie starring Josephine Langford and Hero Fiennes Tiffin, which was followed by four sequels. The latest film, After Everything, debuted in September 2023. This is the only film in the franchise that isn't a direct adaptation of one of the books.
The After books follow Tessa Young, a college student in Washington state, who falls for a "bad boy"—to put it lightly—named Hardin Scott during her freshman year. Their relationship takes off from there, as they deal with various dramatic issues both inside and outside of their relationship and navigate their lives and careers after they graduate from college. The books began as fan fiction inspired by One Direction—particularly Harry Styles, who you might notice has the same initials as Hardin Scott—that Todd published online. Her career as a novelist began quickly afterward.
If you want to get into the books—or just need to make sure you're approaching both them and the films in the correct order—keep reading.
All of the After Books in Release Order
After (2014)
After We Collided (2014)
After We Fell (2014)
After Ever Happy (2015)
Before (2015)
The first four After books tell the story in chronological order. The first book is from Tessa's point of view, while the next three are from both Tessa and Hardin's perspectives. The final book, Before, looks at the events of After from the perspective of Hardin. So, if you really wanted to read them in order of events rather than of release, you could read Before after After.
"For my readers who have been with me since the beginning, this is the long awaited look inside of Hardin’s mind during After and a whole new dose of ‘Hessa’ with a lot of new content, and a few surprises," Todd said in a statement to Entertainment Weekly when the final book was announced.
The Landon Spin-Offs
Nothing More (2016)
Nothing Less (2016)
In addition to the primary After books that focus on Tessa and Hardin, Todd also wrote two spin-off books all about the character Landon Gibson. They follow his move from Washington to New York City and his own love story.
The Graphic Novels
After: The Graphic Novel (Volume One) (2022)
After: The Graphic Novel (Volume Two) (2023)
Lastly, there are two graphic novel versions of the After series that tell the story in two volumes. Todd is still the author and the books are illustrated by Pablo Andrés.
Todd told Screen Rant that it was sometimes a struggle to cut down on her word count for the graphic novel versions, because she tends to write lengthy books. "I pretty much rewrote all of the text, and it was fun, but definitely challenging because there's just so much inner monologue with the characters, especially in the first After, it's just from Tessa's point of view," she explained.
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