Obviously, this is pretty annoying if you’re a person who (like me!) wants to get rid of books after reading them. So if you’re having a problem with that, first go out to your main library view (by touching “Library” if you’re in the middle of reading a book, or by tapping “My Books” at the bottom if you’re anywhere else). Under that view, select whatever header appears at the top:
On the next screen is where you’ll see your collections, which is a topic I’ve written about before. But down at the bottom, the option you need should appear—“Hide iCloud Books.”
Toggle that on, and you’ll only see the items you’ve actually downloaded to your device. Much cleaner!
Of course, if you’d like to go back and re-read something you already bought, you can either turn that setting back on, or you can visit the “Purchased” tab in iBooks to download anything you need. We’re not losing our old books; it’s like we’re just putting them away in a virtual closet so we don’t have to look at them every day. Hey, if my real-life bookshelves can’t be organized, at least my virtual ones can.