Amazon.com has announced a while ago that it would be launching a new version of their electronic book reader called the Kindle, which according to recent details offered by the company, would be slimmer and feature an exclusive release of a new book from Stephen King.

On Monday, Amazon.com’s founder and Chief Executing Officer (CEO) Jeff Bezos revealed during a news conference that was held in New York that the much expected new Kindle would be priced at $359, which is what the current version of the e-book reader costs.

Furthermore, the online retailer said that it would begin shipping the new version of the Kindle on February 24.

The company’s new Kindle is approximately one-third of an inch thick and weighs 10 ounces, while it is fitted with a screen with 16 shades of gray and is said to be capable of reading text aloud and store 1,500 books.

The previous Kindle only includes four shades of gray and stores a number of 200 books.

Amazon.com has also informed that the new Kindle would allow users two weeks of reading on a single charge of the battery.

As for Stephen King’s work that is to be made available exclusively on the Kindle, it is a novella called „Ur” and it will incorporate the gadget into the story.

Back in 2000, King released his „Riding the Bullet” novella as a free download, which gave rise to a high demand for the 66-page story on websites such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble.com.