Kim Jong-Il

This website is a project dedicated to information on books on Kim Jong-Il (Kim Jong Il). The North Korean leader has become an unlikely mascot for the Chelsea Reading Group (CRG) in London. This is after a Kim Jong-Il book recently won a contest to find the best book in the world for men. After reading about the alarming lack of reading amongst men, this seemingly impossible question is the one we set about to find an answer, and to hopefully address.

In a nutshell, our questioning followed the same principle of selectively narrowing down that researchers used to find that Mona Lisa had to be the world’s favorite painting. We found the most likely candidate book would be: (1) a biography (men in general having a preference overall for factual books over fiction) (2) about a famous male, preferably a tactical and military leader (3) be an intriguing and central figure, that yet about whom relatively little is known. After lively debate, we found that other contenders (like Churchill, Hitler and Rommel) satisfied this last category less well than our eventual winner, North Korean leader, Kim Jong Il.

We surveyed all the literature on the Korean leader, and in the end, found and read three books as contenders for Most Interesting Book in the World for Men. Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynastyby Bradley K. Martin was found to be our number 1 (followed closely by several others shown below). It sat nicely between the gossipy or more military-focused others, and understanding Kim Jong-Il’s father Kim Il-Sung, is vital to understanding the figure.

And after we had chosen our book (and tested it on our brothers, fathers, and friends) what did members decide? Well, while all testers had differing opinions, it was agreed that our selection process had succeeded in at least finding at least one of the world’s- currently - most interesting books for blokes!
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You can read more about the book our contest chose by clicking here.

Lots of men (and women) have written us to say they enjoyed our “best book in the world for men”. If you did, you might be interested in other books on the same topic, some of which were very close in the same category as our eventual winner.