> Honor is a Mary Sue, clearly. Just because a character is such doesn't have to mean they're not fun or interesting to follow along with

I would agree with both those statements. That said, the big problem I had with the series (besides Weber's very obvious tendencies toward inserting his personal politics) and the reason I gave up on it was that everything goes right for her.

You can have a character who's overpowered, better than others, and even just out and out perfect, but when you then feel the need to make all their enemies stupid, and everyone else fawn over them, and everything just happen to work out in their favor, it kills any real dramatic tension. Having a character overcome superior odds through cleverness and skill is great; having them overcome superior odds because their enemies are idiots who just happen to do everything exactly wrong is boring.