I have been very suprised by the lack of 'good' books/items going up for sale paticularly in light of the Hobbit film being released.

I was anticipating a flooding of the market similar to the effect the LOTR film had but it appears not. Ebay numbers under a 'Tolkien' search has gone up to around 11,500 items from 10,500 and has maintained this over Christmas but in the main this has been the usual film tie in's etc.

Even abe books havent had a huge amount more put up for sale.

Whilst I have brought some items I wouldnt say it is a huge amount more than usual.

Anyone else noticed this /thoughts ?

In the last quarter of 2012 I have bought very little on eBay, or anywhere else for that matter. But, yes, I'd agree --there's not been much of great interest.

Since October (for those interested ) I've bought the following on eBay:

The Color Over Occam [a Cthulhu Mythos novel] (Oct.)
Farmer Giles Of Ham [3rd imp.] (Nov.)
Empire Aristocrat typewriter [! ] (Nov.)
Lovecraft At Last [vol. of H. P. Lovecraft letters] (Nov.)
Lord Of The Rings [2004 St. Hb. 1st imp.] (Dec.)

...and various other sundries, like typewriter ribbon & guitar strings. But books? Naw, not very much. I've bought more from other sources (another half dozen items; two of them pre-orders from earlier in the year, so already paid for long ago), but scant Tolkien; only the little jacketless 2012 Hobbit from Amazon in this time frame.

BH