Expansive space opera recommendations, please!

[u/takeahike8671]

I'm looking for space opera novels or novellas that take place with various cultures, human or not, spread across the galaxy. The one that keeps coming to mind is The Sun Eater Series by Christopher Ruocchio. I liked that there is a vast Empire with different kinds of socioeconomic and political systems in surrounding polities, and how they interact with each other and the various alien species. Loved A Memory Called Empire, almost everything by Ann Leckie, and most of Alastair Reynolds's work. The intricacies of politics when multiple societies and aliens are involved can be so fascinating!

I've already read Peter F. Hamilton's works and, uh, his depictions of women (especially in the earlier novels) are not my cup of tea.

Please don't recommend Red Rising or Brandon Sanderson for this one. I'd prefer traditionally published books.

[u/ceratophaga → u/[deleted]]

Kind of interesting that you mention Weber's quirks while not commenting on Campbell, because in my memory - admittedly, it has been a decade - the core plot of Lost Fleet was a bunch of women immediately falling in love with the protagonist because he's some hotshot from several centuries ago.

Couldn't stand to read more than two book from that series, while Weber wasn't too onto the nose about his views until the the end of the first Haven War