Amazon’s Kindle is now available to Canadians, the on-line retailer announced today (November 17).

But the e-book reader can’t be bought from the Seattle-based company’s Canadian site.

Canadians must purchase the Kindle from Amazon’s U.S. store and have it shipped across the border.

Selling for US$259, the Kindle allows users to buy and download digital versions of books, magazines, and newspapers over a cellular network.

In today's press release, Amazon listed the features now available to Canadian customers:

• Slim and Trim: At just over a third of an inch thin (0.36 inches) and weighing just over 10 ounces, Kindle is pencil thin and lighter than a typical paperback.
• 3G Wireless: Readers can wirelessly shop the Kindle Store, download books in less than 60 seconds, automatically receive newspaper and magazine subscriptions, and read from their library-now in more than 100 countries and territories including Canada.
• Reads Like Real Paper: Kindle's 6-inch electronic ink display reads like printed words on paper because the screen works using real ink and doesn't use a backlight, eliminating the eyestrain and glare associated with other electronic displays.
• Stores Up to 1,500 Books: Kindle's 2 GB of memory holds up to 1,500 books and Kindle books are automatically backed up by Amazon so customers can re-download titles in their library.
• Read for Weeks on a Single Charge: Kindle's electronic paper display sips battery power so users can read for over two weeks with wireless turned off and up to four days on a single charge with wireless on.
• Read-To-Me: With the experimental Text-To-Speech feature, Kindle can read most newspapers, magazines and books out loud.
• Automatically Syncs With Kindle and Kindle Compatible Devices: Amazon's "Whispersync" technology automatically syncs customers' last page read, bookmarks, notes, and highlights across Kindle, Kindle DX, and Kindle compatible devices like Kindle for iPhone and Kindle for PC.
• Read Personal Documents: Read personal documents in a variety of formats such as Microsoft Word and PDF.
• Instant Dictionary Lookup: Kindle comes with the New Oxford American Dictionary and over 250,000 definitions that appear instantly at the bottom of the page.
• Choose Text Size: Kindle lets readers customize their reading preference by providing six different text sizes.
• Bookmarks, Notes and Highlights: By using the QWERTY keyboard, Kindle users can add annotations to text, as well as highlight and clip key passages and bookmark pages for future use.

More than 300,000 books are available to Canadians in the Kindle Store.

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