Unfortunately, you'd be hard pressed to find an anglophone scholar who works on the war itself, and you'd have an even harder time finding a publisher for a book like the one you describe. The majority of things written in English about the War have been military histories that, while using primary sources, are a little "dry" and feel very dated.

Michael Howard's "The Franco-Prussian War: The German Invasion of France" (NY, 1961) is a good example of this kind of military history, but as I said - it's dated.

The most recent book-length study of the war has been in French, by Stephane Audoin-Rouzeau, "1870: La France dans la guerre" (Paris, 1981). It has not been translated.

On the other hand, there has been a number of people that are writing about the German siege of Paris at the end of the war, and even more people who are writing about the Paris Commune. Alistair Horne wrote a great anecdotal book called "The Fall of Paris" (1965) that feels a little less dated than Howard. Hollis Clayson wrote an art history book on the war and the siege called "Paris in Despair" (2003).

Believe me, I'm as upset as you that there are no good book-length studies. The war is just not very popular, especially outside of France.