The 7 books (about to be 8) mentioned is George R.R. Martin's book series "A Song of Fire And Ice" (better known as A Game of Thrones), in which there are no elves and only one dwarf of very real-life make. I'm suspecting they turned the warring factions of humans into different races in Dragon Age. There is supposed to be a second video game based off his books so maybe that will have a different feel. But it is said that Cyanide Games picked up the rights and they plan a RTS and a RPG. I'm not sure if they partnered with Bioware or not. But given what I've heard about the PC version perhaps it is the RTS side of it. Not sure on that.
Cyanide are making an RPG and an RTS, which seems a bit ambitious for a company whose only claim to fame are the BLOOD BOWL games (as fun as those are). BioWare said they loved AGoT and were 'inspired' by it in making DRAGON AGE, to the point of having some references to it (like the knights being addressed as 'Ser'). However, they weren't going to pony up the money for it since they decided after KotOR not to do licenses any more (unless offered tons of money by LucasArts to do an MMORPG, apparently).
Similarly, the lead designer of COMPANY OF HEROES said he loved the books as well and would be 'interested' in doing them as a game, the prospect of which (Relic doing a GoT game) got a lot of people excited until it turned out to just be an idle thought and Relic/THQ weren't going to spend money on the licence. Then it went to Cyanide and that was the end of that.
What made giving out the license a bad idea was that literally days later HBO bought the TV rights to A GAME OF THRONES. They just finished filming the pilot episode today. If it goes to series and becomes a big hit on HBO like TRUE BLOOD, then someone like BioWare or Relic would have been fifty times more likely to pick up the game rights, which of course can't now happen.
In the meantime though, there is an early release for a mod based on MEDIEVAL II: TOTAL WAR available:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=256115
The generic Tolkien set lore that dictates nearly all fantasy literature needs some revamping, not because it's bad, but because redefining the standard accepted basis for fantasy lore if done well opens a whole new realm of possibility for literature, games, etc... In essence we need a second Tolkien. A new innovator of the genre.
What books published in the last 10-15 years have you been reading?

No-one in their right mind does elves and dwarves any more in fantasy literature, apart from those who started out with them and are continuing to write the same series (Brooks and Feist, basically).
Let's see, we have George RR Martin as mentioned above. Very few non-human races and low magic, much more heavily based by real history. Joe Abercrombie's FIRST LAW TRILOGY and its sequel, BEST SERVED COLD, are in a similar vein, as is Patrick Rothfuss' NAME OF THE WIND and Scott Lynch's LIES OF LOCKE LAMORA series.
If you want to go in the opposite direction you have Steven Erikson's MALAZAN series, with absolutely tons of non-human races and insane levels of magic. No elves or dwarves but races like the T'lan Imass, a race of undead neanderthals who committed racial suicide and then came back in a magic ritual to pursue their ancestral enemies (who had made themselves immortal to escape them) through time.
Then you have R. Scott Bakker whose PRINCE OF NOTHING trilogy is halfway between the two. Based on real history, few non-human races (although one of those is elf-like, but the other one is a bunch of rapist space aliens and their genetically-engineered slave race) and very few magic-users, but those who do exist are very badass and can level cities.
For something a bit more out there you have China Mieville's Bas-Lag novels, beginning with PERDIDO STREET STATION. Much more technologically advanced, mixing steampunk and trains with some more traditional fantasy ideas. Lots of nonhuman races but they're more offbeat, such as a race of clockwork robots and sentient cactus-men.