Making the Sony Reader experience more book-like

I just got back from vacation, and instead of having to haul 5 kilos of books from the US to Greece, or having to devote an entire day to buying new books when I arrived in Greece, I downloaded 30 books to my Sony Reader, which weighs 200 grams, and I was done! I love this little thing for several reasons. Obviously, being able to carry that much reading material in that little space, and not compromise the reading experience (as you would if it was loaded on a palmtop or laptop device) is huge. In addition, I love that the battery life is measured in page turns, not time left on or time left lying around (although, like any battery, I'm sure there's a self-discharge rate, but I suspect it's negligible). That means I can read my several thousand pages when I feel like it, and as fast as I feel like it. In addition, several thousand page turns is really quite adequate for a week of reading, at my vacation pace, so I didn't have to charge the Reader until I got back from our beach house, which is not on the power grid, and got ready to get on a plane.

One thing that would make me love my Reader even more is the following. Reading a book starts with a little introduction, the "priming" action of holding the book and opening it to your page. Every book looks and feels different, and this priming action actually serves a purpose. I would absolutely love it if the Reader similarly incorporated a priming action, a Pavlov's bell that puts the reader (with a lower-case "r", as in the person reading) into reading mode. That could be something very traditional, like a 2 second flash of an image, the "cover" of the book, or it could be something innovative, like a literal Pavlovian chime, which could be different for each book, or unique to each Reader device (like a ringtone), or perhaps even uniform across all Readers (think about the fact that iPhones, for one, have completely uniform system noises!). I think something like this, a two second visual or auditory hint that "I'm now reading a book" would enhance the Reader experience.