Yeah, I quite enjoyed Stormfront. It feels weird with the absolute need to write about the breasts and looks of every woman in the book, and it makes it feel fairly shallow. But there’s something that feels like it will become a really good series in there too, so I’m inclined to try a few more.

There are in universe and out of universe reasons for the general tendency of Harry to be the a benevolent sexist in the books. Out of universe, it’s playing on many of the tropes of classic noir stories and that was a really common one. There’s a longer story behind us that I can write out if you care, but basically this first one was written in protest by the author to include as many tropes and clichés to try and prove a point and he failed successfully. In universe, you learn a bit in this one and more over the next few books, but Dresden grew up without a female presence in his life, and really did not learn much beyond what was written in early sci-fi, and fantasy novels, and then, when he was a teenager in a extremely unhealthy relationship.

That said, it is never treated virtuously in any of the books. It gets him in trouble many times, other women in the books call him on it, and he does recognize that it is something he needs to change in himself. And it isn’t a perspective that is shared by the author, in so far as it doesn’t appear when he writes other characters.