As the April 3rd launch date of the iPad inches closer, the details of what we're actually going to see on the laptop without a hinge and a keyboard have been a little sparse. We were promised the future with this thing!  I want to see some magic books!

Well, at very least, I would like to see some reason to fork out several hundred dollars for what still seems a little like a bigger version of my iPhone.  Finally, however, we're hearing from individual publishers what they'll have going on around the device's launch date.

David Baldacci seems like a guy who probably doesn't need a gimmick to sell books, so he's an interesting case study for the new world of enhanced e-books, especially since he has a new title on April 20th.  It's definitely interesting that all three versions of his book (hardcover, regular and enhanced e-book) will be released on the same day, and what was surprising to me was that the enhanced e-book wasn't going to be vastly more expensive than its less flashy counterpoint, only one extra buck.  And what will the slightly obsessive Baldacci fan get for that dollar?  Basically, the publishing version of the extras on a DVD:  deleted scenes, photos, interviews and video of Baldacci working (weird).  I wasn't exactly going to buy any version of Baldacci's book (sorry, buddy), but at least if you do want the extra stuff, and you already dropped the cash on the iPad, the publisher isn't gouging you on the content front.

However, when an article mentions a deluxe editon of David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, I already have my credit card out ready to spend.  Why it didn't occur to me before, I have no idea, but Infinite Jest's giant collection of endnotes would be perfect for the enhanced format.  Instead of keeping one finger in the narrative and trying to find a little blurb of possibly extraneous text in the back, we can have a pop-up note that we can send away when we're ready to go back to be confused by the book itself.  Expect more to come on the iPad and possibly some news about regular books at some point as well.