User blog comment:TheStudyOfTheUnknown/How big is the LOTR fancies/@comment-26453572-20150811153209

The reason LOTR is so small is because it's so old (referring to books). This is based purely off of profit, from what I've gathered. If LOTR books were newer, they would probably be much higher. Then again, it would be entirely different, so they might actually not be so good. So many people have the books that they don't need to buy new ones, they just get hand-me-downs from relatives. In fact, if PJ hadn't made any films about ME, the numbers would probably be much lower. Lord of the Rings was already extremely popular, but PJ made it even more popular. It was so popular that Tolkien had to take his number out of the phone books, and he regretted not having an early retirement.