G M Malliet wrote a series of three mysteries featuring Detective Chief Inspector St Just. They are:
Death of a Cozy Writer (2008)
Death and the Lit Chick (2009)
Death at the Alma Mater (2010)
I don't know why she wrote no more in this series because they are splendid mysteries with non-predictable plots - though they aren't impossible to figure out if you try - and some interesting characters, especially the obnoxious ones.)
Malliet is a clever writer and has a way with metaphors:
She loved Winston with all the devotion and sublime lack of awareness of a Golden Retriever nursing an orphaned bloodhound pup.
Give Malliet a try.