Product Description : A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books The passion to possess books has never been more widespread than it is today indeed obsessive book collecting remains the only hobby to have a disease named after it A Gentle Madness finalist for the 1995 National Book Critics Circle award is an adventure among the afflicted Richly anecdotal and fully documented it combines the perspective of historical research with the immediacy of investigative journalism Above all it is a celebration of books and the people who have revered gathered and preserved them over the centuries ( it is an used product)