If you own an iPad and you purchased it new, you know the device doesn’t come with a user’s guide. And while many of the iPad’s functions are easy to intuit or figure out with just a little bit of experimentation, there are undoubtedly plenty of things remaining undiscovered for the average user.

To really get to know your device, start at the beginning and read The Missing Manual by J.D. Biersdorfer all the way through. Biersdorfer has broken down his tutorial into chapters that you can flip to when you have a specific question, starting with simple keyboard stuff like how to take a shortcut to .us, .org and .edu when you’re typing in a web address (press and hold the period button) or how to find accented letters (press and hold the key in question.)

Readers will learn how to have the iPad take dictation, use FaceTime to make Internet calls, search for a particular phrase in an iBook and learn how to do a myriad of things with photo galleries.

Gamers can learn how to beam games to an Apple TV, control certain functions of an Xbox game console from the iPad or even play a game of Scrabble against the device.

Not all of the iPad’s functions are geared to having fun; there’s also a chapter that explains how to use the device’s free iWork suite for business purposes.

Completely up to date, the book offers tips on iPads of every generation, including the new iPad Air.

Grade: A