The Lone Drow by R. A. Salvatore

At the start of bestseller Salvatore's second book in his Tolkienesque fantasy trilogy (after 2002's The Thousand Orcs), hordes of orcs, led by cruel King Obould Many-Arrows, sweep down mechanically and unexcitingly on beleaguered dwarves. When he isn't slaying orcs, the story's hero, the dark elf drow loner Drizzt Do'Urden, suffers guilt for allowing a friendly elf to die in his stead and is attracted to Catti-brie, a beautiful human woman who is the ward of the dying dwarf king, Bruenor Battlehammer. The usual fantasy suspects-gnomes, trolls, elves, flying horses, unicorns, giants-crowd the pages, but the author does at times rise above cliche, and a few characters do achieve some complexity.