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I ordinarily would read only published order, but then I made an exception for a special case. Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series set in the Napoleonic Wars (with a three-book prequel) were written out of chronological order and it's strongly recommended that readers take them in the order of events. I had to admit there was some justification in that to get the grand sweep of the Peninsular War in particular; I even asked here before starting them and was unanimously told that the chronology was the thing.
Unfortunately, I think in this case there was no good answer or, alternatively, each method had its drawbacks. I mentioned above getting much more out of historical aspect of the books when you could follow Wellington's army from Portugal through Spain. But it's undeniable that the back story changes and it also means a high level of mortality for the love interest (there's always a love interest) in the books set earlier but written later. I suppose a side benefit to the chronological order is that the first few published books weren't all that good and I might not have persevered had I started with them, but I was hooked by the time I got to them in the chronology.
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