The Man Booker Prize has launched a free app, apparently the "UK's first app for a literary prize". The free app offers access to the Booker archive, a history of the prize, author interviews, video content and audio. There is also a neat GPS service that will also allow users to search for their local book shop or to buy directly from online retailers' websites.

This is a friendly little app for Booker enthusiasts packed with rich data going back through the archives, and up to date with information about this year's prize and long-listed books. There are extracts available of this year's crop, including audio extracts. There is video of some of the past winners, and shortlisted books, and presumably the publishers of the new selection will have the option of adding video at a future date.

There are also links through to bookshops—Waterstone's, Foyles, Play.com, Amazon, and W H Smith—though in all cases the link took me through to the print version, not a digital one. And the iBookstore was not represented.

There isn't enough content to justify a fee for the app, and the extracts felt a little short to me. But the app will clearly come into its own as the shortlist and winners are revealed, and I look forward to the regular updates.

The best thing about it for now was the bookshop locator. A handy tool for any that could exist quite happily outside of the Man Booker app. I can't help thinking that offering no direct link to digital version was a bit of a miss, given the medium, though maybe there are good reasons for this.