We all have our passions, and sometimes those passions just take over our lives and cause us to do extraordinary things. Such is the case to a gentleman in Japan.

It is the story of a 61-year-old man who Japanese police say stole nearly 1,100 library books to satisfy what appears to be a case of kleptomania combined with an intense passion for books.

Mitsuka Suizu was arrested earlier this year for stealing a few books from the public library. This in turn led to a search of his home where they found nearly 1,200 books that had been stolen over the course of seven years -- at a value of more than $25,000.

“He loves books,” said Nagato police spokesperson Yosuke Miyoshi. “He didn’t just want to read them. He wanted them by his side.”

The library staff has identified almost 900 of the books as being their property, police are still searching for where the other 274 came from.

At this time, the legal process has not decided what kind of punishment the offense the will be. They probably won't throw the book at him.

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