What was the name of J.R.R. Tolkien’s sequel to The Hobbit?

J.R.R. Tolkien’s sequel to The Hobbit was The Lord of the Rings.

Tolkien began writing the work after his publisher asked for another book featuring hobbits. The project expanded far beyond a simple children’s sequel and became a large-scale epic about the One Ring, Sauron, and the struggle to save Middle-earth. Tolkien worked on it for many years, revising both its story and its underlying languages and history.

The Lord of the Rings was published in three volumes: The Fellowship of the Ring in 1954, and The Two Towers and The Return of the King in 1955. Tolkien regarded it as one continuous novel rather than a trilogy in the usual sense, though its length and printing history made the three-volume format practical.

The title is sometimes mistakenly treated as referring only to the first volume. The complete work is The Lord of the Rings, while The Fellowship of the Ring is its opening volume.