Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler.

Vatta’s War series by Elizabeth Moon is solid. Starts just a tad slow but ramps up quickly into action. I reread it every other year or two.

Well my first recommendation was going to be Ancillary Justice, but there’s also Artemis by Andy Weir! It’s been a minute since I’ve read it but I don’t immediately recall it snacking of a “men writing women” feel.

Edit: Not super SciFi, but like steampunk fantasy maybe… Another option might be Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson.

Second Edit: Whatever you do DONT read Hyperion. Oof that one was one of the most ridiculous examples of “men writing women” I have read, although he notably grew as the series progressed.

Pretty much anything by Cherie Priest, the Clockwork Century books are great!

Look, at this point I’m basically just “That guy who recommends the Luna books”, but this is yet another situation where they really are the right answer. Luna: New Moon is your starting point. The series is absolutely bursting at the seams with diverse and interesting female and non-binary characters. It also features some wonderfully atypical male characters who really play around with our understanding of what it means to perform masculinity. I am obsessed with Lucas Corta, iron fisted patriarch whose one weakness is for the beautiful young man who plays bossa nova for him, and I’m equally obsessed with his son Lucasino, the rich kid playboy who has fucked his way through his entire friendship circle, and loves makeup, androgynous clothes and baking.

Anyway, Luna: New Moon by Ian MacDonald. Give it a look.

The Steerswoman series by Rosemary Kirstein, and the Merchant Princes series by Charles Stross—both series that may not seem like sci-fi at first, but become increasingly so as they progress.

I thought YT was a well written character in Snow Crash. She took no shit from anyone.

Less scifi and more fantasy, I just finished The Priory Of The Orange Tree and I highly recommend

And just want to add A Great And Terrible Beauty as another Fantasy book that is a wonderful read (series)

Artemis by Am6dy Weir might be a good match.

The Space Between Worlds vy Micaiah Johnson

A Half-Built Garden by Ruthanna Emrys

Pretty much anything by Octavia Butler.

I see lots of good picks here, a few of my favourites books mentioned… I love The Expanse in particular, but “Pushing Ice” by Alastair Reynolds had a better focus on complex female characters.

Echoing what others have already said here: The Expanse. The depth and quality of pretty much all the main characters is great. And there are several fantastic female characters who are strong, smart, and wonderfully written.

Gideon the Ninth?

Takes like 5 chapters for it to find it’s feet but it’s lesbian necromancers and swordfighters in space with a very snarky point of veiw character.

It’s kind of more scifi fantasy but a good time.

The Bel Dame series by Kameron Hurley is good. It starts with God’s War.

I had so much fun reading The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty. It is squarely in the fantasy genre. Not SciFi like you’re asking for. But I can’t recommend it enough.

Amina is a very rare character: she is simultaneously an older woman, a single mom, a pirate, a lover, and a legendary hero. Chakraborty does an admirable job of balancing all these different aspects of her main character’s personality. The story is bombastic and fun, the supporting characters are charming, the setting is historical and fantastic all at once. This book is incredible, I could not put it down.

I have heard good things about the audio book. I read it in text form though, so I can’t confirm that myself.