It's an in-character perspective of Dresden, meant to be a character quirk. Jim writes short stories from other perspectives without the same issues, and none of his other series have it either. Unfortunately many readers confuse character perspective with author opinion.
On multiple occasions he talks about how he thinks of the carpenter girls as children, comments some crap about knowing them in diapers right before going on to talk about their tits.
Holy shit. He gets weirder? He's such a neckbeard in the first few that I stopped at like book 4. Maybe 3. I don't even remember. To be worse, he must start complementing their feet in public or some shit.
On multiple occasions he talks about how he thinks of the carpenter girls as children, comments some crap about knowing them in diapers right before going on to talk about their tits.
I’ll be the contrarian here and suggest that—especially if you’re OK with trying one book out of order and then going back to read the rest just so that you can get a feel for the books—that you start with Dead Beat. It was written as an introduction for new fans when the Dresden files TV show was getting ready to come out. It really shows off some of Jim Butcher’s strengths as an author after he got his feet underneath him. It’s the book that the fairly well-known (spoilery) meme is from.
As to Dresden’s, chauvinism, this older Reddit comment, probably addresses it as well as any I’ve seen. I will say that it isn’t just treated as though it must be there. There are strong, textual and sub-textual reasons why he acts and thinks the way he does, it’s never treated virtuously, it does get him in trouble, and he does realize he has to be better.
First, of all, not a leader, just a mod, trying to do my part in making lemmy a nice place for book readers. 😀
Dresden Files is a pretty fun series, but it's not some great epitome of literature. It's a fun and easy to read series, and I am realizing after reading all the comment here, it's not for everyone. Personally, I don't have much issue with that. I don't always agree with the characters of my books, but I can understand if people have issues with that. I would suggest reading a couple of books to see if they are for you.
As for where to start, I always prefer to read in published order, (which in this case is also chronological order), but as everyone else has mentioned first couple of books aren't that great. The quality improves a lot from the 3rd one. So, if you start from first one, at least read first 3 to make up your mind. Or, you can read "Dead Beat" first, and if you like it, go back and start from the first one.
If you do start reading it, would love to hear your thoughts on how you like it. You can post in our weekly what are you reading thread, or just make a separate post.
Edit: Forgot to mention, the books are pretty formulaic, (don't know if they improve further along or not), I don't think I would enjoy them reading back to back. But reading them after adding a break of one or two books is keeping them very enjoyable.
At the start, Storm Front. It's a slow start IMO, the series takes a little while to hit its stride, but it does a lot of "stage setting" that is going to be important later on. I wouldn't mess with the order, at least until much later in the series.
The books are meant to be read in chronological order, which is publication order for the novels. The short stories can be inserted into the chronological order, or skipped until you've read all the novels.
There are two schools of opinion on where to start. His first few books are the weakest, and Jim himself recommends skipping them and starting at Grave Peril. Others recommend just going in at the start so you can meet characters as they're introduced.
The first book, Storm Front, is awful. Apparently he wrote it as part of a college project? I've been told the series gets better as it goes along, but I was never able to get past the first book.
It was a creative writing class by another author if I remember the story. He had graduated with a literature degree already and was trying and failing to write super high-minded stuff and get it published. This teacher and he were butting heads because she wanted him to basically do a story that he considered trope-y or cliched. So finally he sat down to prove her wrong and out popped the first part of Dresden files. She sent him home to map out the rest and he misunderstood and mapped out the entire series when she meant the rest of the book.
I didn't even mind the writing. I read the first three or four. I could even get past some of the cliche shit like electronics breaking because he's a wizard harry. But he is such a m'lady neckbeard that I just gave up.
I'd suggest taking a break with something else (another series) every five books or so... apart from a few of them, his stories definitely follow a pattern that becomes quite obvious after a few books and that break keeps them feeling fresh.