A thousand orcs is an awful lot of orcs. ...and this book had an awful lot of orcs.
...and dwarves. This was definitely a dwarf book. I like dwarves. We've got good ol' Bruenor, his old friend Thibbledorf Pwent, his new friend Dagnabbit, our old friends Ivan and Pikel Bouldershoulder from the Cleric series, plus a new and interesting group led by new character Torgar Hammerstriker. Anyway, this book has dwarves coming out the ears.
...and it was a fun fantasy, siege/last stand romp. It definitely treads familiar ground (helm's deep, anyone?) but again, if you're looking for originality in fantasy literature, why are you 22 books deep in RA Salvatore?
The characters and their actions do seem a bit tired, maybe a bit forced, hence losing (only) half a star in my estimation. I did like the character development of Regis the Hob..er..halfling, though. Again, it's dumb fantasy, and it's good dumb fantasy.
One note: this was the FIRST book (of 22) in which I did NOT casually find typos. I guess it had to happen sometime.
