I've heard that "space opera" of the Darkover & Pern sort is usually called "planetary romance".
Since you're willing to do sf-fantasy, Steven Brust's excellent Vlad Taltos series kind of just barely qualifies, since the Jenoine are technically some sort of space aliens and all the humans apparently live on some sort of post-apocalyptic planet along with some other technical space aliens. Though it really is mostly presented in a Lankhmar-ish fantasy city kind of way, with swords and magic and assassins and obstructionist bureaucracy.
But there are plenty of strong female major characters, as one of the technically alien species has no gender barriers for personal/professional achievements the way that most pseudo-medievalish fantasy societies (not to mention in-the-future-we-will-have-amazing-technology-but-no-advances-in-treating-people-equally sf societies) do.
And they're really entertaining books, though they may be insufficiently sfnal to be what you're currently looking for.
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