You order your books directly from Amazon.com or other sources. They will download to your Kindle. Once you are finished with that book you have the choice to remove from the Kindle and it will be archived. When you open the home page there will be a choice of "Archived Items". You can choose this then choose what book that is in your archives that you want to open and it will then download to your Kindle. Hope that makes sense. I am not very techno-minded and have had no problems using the Kindle. Have had mine almost 2 years and love it. Hope this helps.