That's the end of a quiet read: Now the ebook comes with added sound effects and songs



It may surprise bookworms, but apparently masterpieces such as Jane Eyre are lacking a certain something – sound effects.

An electronic-book firm is adding background noises and music to the works of Charlotte Bronte, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and William Shake- speare in the hope of attracting younger readers.

In one example, a description of rain lashing against a window in a Sherlock Holmes story will be ‘enhanced’ with matching noises.

Music to my ears? The first multimedia ebooks - with sounds to accompany novels - will available this Friday in the UK

The Booktrack releases are available to iPad users, with other tablet computer versions to follow.



The concept is already in use in the U.S., where the classics come with added sound effects.



Readers for example can hear the china cups chinking in Mr Darcy's garden as they read Pride And Prejudice.



A story by Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie will be released later in the year with a specially crafted orchestral score.

Rushdie's story In The South will be released with a soundtrack provided by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra.

There is huge support for the development which is hoped will spark young people's interest in literature.

Innovative: The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra will provide the score for a short story by Salman Rushie

The Power Of Six by Pittacus Lore, a novel for young adults, is one of the first to be trialled with a soundtrack which builds in suspense in keeping with the plot.



It has been created by Booktrack which synchronises music to each novel. It is funded by Peter Thiel, a co-founder of PayPal.



It works by timing the speed of each reader and the software measures the 'turning' of a page and moves the music or sounds along accordingly.



Mr Thiel said: 'It's always exciting to witness the creation of a new form of media. The technology promises to captivate readers in a way that will seem intuitive in hindsight.'

However they have been greeted with horror by traditionalists, who say the technology takes away the pleasure of having one’s imagination stimulated by a story.

They also raise the prospect of having to ask an overly eager reader to turn their book down.

David Nicholls, whose bestseller One Day was recently turned into a film starring Anne Hathaway, said: ‘This sounds like the opposite of reading. It would be a distraction.’







