Mysteries

Grafton isn't my favorite writer in the female-protagonist popular mystery genre, but she certainly paved the way for dozens of variations to spring up.  I do think she was the first author to do quite what she does, at least in recent times, and I'm glad for that.   I followed her series through about R, but by then I think she was just continuing to finish out the alphabet rather than because she had that many more good ideas.  If you want to try Grafton in her prime, I recommend something earlier on.  The Kinsey sequence is pretty fun along about D and E, if I recall.

Then, I should add that I do quite like a lot of mystery series (although there are piles I dislike, too, usually ones with overly complicated plots, although I made an exception for Lawrence Block burglar series, as the rest of his writing is funny enough to make up for it).  Mysteries are the fluff I read when I want something light and thought-free, so I'm much less critical of them when it comes to writing/plot holes/etc.

If I were recommending mystery series or authors, I would also recommend:

Dick Francis: lovely, and very British, but in a good way.  He writes mysteries based in some way around the world of horse-racing, having been the Queen's jockey for a while.  There are three or four of his that I dislike, and on the order of 30 I like.  Also, they can be read in any order.

Dana Stabenow: the Kate Shugak series.  Set in Alaska, these feature a female Aleut protagonist, without getting all hokey about American Indians (something that, growing up in Montana, I got plenty of to last me).  They're funny in spots, and the stories are about the right complication.  You can often guess the who or the why but because the story is often more about how to prove it, or how to confirm it, than who did it.  I like that, as it means she doesn't have to write ridiculous curve-ball plots to keep you stumped.  These ought to be read in order.

Tony Hillerman: oddly, more Indian mysteries.  These are set on the Big Res, the huge Indian reservation that sits at the four corners where Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado meet.  These do get a bit hokey at times, but only when it informs the plot (you have to deal with Navajo beliefs about ghosts, for instance, if you're investigating a murder on a res.)  The reason these are interesting, to me, is that they delve into the cultures of the Indians who live there (not just Navajo, but also the Hopi and some Lakota and others), and they also examine the way our law enforcement system works there.  The Indians govern themselves, to a point, and have their own local cops, but the feds can also come in in some cases--it's a mess.  These should be read in approximate order, although they aren't so intertwined that if you miss one or two you'll kill the story.  

(Upon reflection, I like mysteries as much for the light they shed on their setting as the stories themselves.)

Charlene Harris also wrote a set of mysteries that all start out "Shakespeare's something-or-other," which I thought were good, but somewhat grim.  Her female protagonist is not in a light-and-fluffy place.

And of course, there's Janet Evanovitch, so fluffy they're barely novels.  I enjoyed the first few, and found them funny, and am not so interested anymore.  But they're a favorite of lots of people.