Our dollars are pretty much at par. Yet on most items, US pricing is so much better. Books for instance can run us $4-5 more for a new release soft cover for example, than the same book in the US, despite our dollars being near to par. You should have seen the rukus across Canada when our dollar was above the US dollar yet our prices were much higher for identical items. Also, things like eReaders I've never seen on sale in Canada yet see sales advertised for the US. So you might be able to luck into a better price. But even still, there are some good readers from $100 and up.
I get the joy of the books too. Love book stores, libraries, all things books. I'm happy to buy regular books when I realllly want them to keep for a collection. And I'm finding I'm saving so much with the ereader, I can afford more pricey books from time to time to add to a permanent collection. I'm learning it's easy to blend both regular books and ebooks into my reading formats.