I would tell you to go read the Vorkosigan saga but they generally don't meet your criteria. I assume 14 books (+2 in the same universe but out of main continuity) falls under the umbrella of "a thousand". Although you could just read the first two, the Cordelia books (Shards of Honor and Barrayar) and decide from there if you want in on the series aspect. The books have gotten longer as the series goes on, my omnibus of the two (called Cordelia's Honor) is 590 pages but that's TWO novels.

Oh! The Witches of Karres by James Schmitz is very under-appreciated but it's very funny and short. I'm not 100% sure if it should be classified as fantasy or SF but there's space travel and the witches are aliens so I'll go with SF.