Apple CEO Steve Jobs made a surprise appearance at the iPad 2 unveiling last month in San Francisco.

Steve Jobs has reportedly been participating on a biography about his life to be published next year.

Apple's chief executive has been working with Simon & Schuster biographer Walter Isaacson on "iSteve: The Book of Jobs," which is expected to be published in early 2012, according to an Associated Press report. Isaacson has been working on the book since 2009 and has interviewed Jobs, family members, and colleagues for the book, according to the report.

A Simon & Schuster spokesperson said no further details were available, and Apple representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment. (Simon & Schuster is a unit of CBS Corp., whose CBS Interactive unit is the publisher of CNET.)

Although there have been other biographies printed about Apple's iconic co-founder, this is being billed as the first published with his participation. An unauthorized biography titled "iCon: Steve Jobs, The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business" by Jeffrey Young was published in 2005 by John Wiley & Sons. The publisher promised "insider scoops and no-holds-barred style" but was criticized by Jobs and led to the removal of all Wiley books from Apple stores.

Perhaps fueling interest is a string of health problems that have dogged Jobs in recent years and forced him to take periodic leaves of absence from the company. Jobs announced in January that he was taking an indefinite medical leave from Apple--his third in recent years--and handing over day-to-day responsibility to Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook.

In January 2009, Jobs said that he was suffering from a hormone imbalance that was impeding his body's ability to absorb certain proteins. In April of that year, Jobs underwent liver transplant surgery and returned to work by early July. In August 2004, Jobs underwent successful surgery to treat a rare form of pancreatic cancer, which sidelined him until September of that year.