Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editor Bob Hoover

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editor Bob Hoover details “Lord of the Rings” plan to overtake Harry Potter with a two-pronged attack as detailed at the recent BookExpo America.

Harry Potter’s in for a rumble on the playground. The bespectacled Brit’s grip on the kids’ entertainment biz is under assault from another fictional corner of England known as Middle Earth.

Call it “The Hobbit Strikes Back” when Houghton Mifflin and New Line Cinema launch a two-pronged war on J.K. Rowling’s hero this winter.