Anonymous asked :
Hey! I hope you are well :) I had a quick question about the my grammar. If I wanted to say 'Do you have any books?' would it be correct to say, As-tu des livres? Or As-tu de livres? Could you also explain why? I'm trying to understand all the smaller parts of French grammar. Thanks!
You use “de/du/de la” when you can’t count “the subject”. You can count books but you can’t count water for example.
As-tu un livre ? Do you have a book?
As-tu plusieurs livres ? Do you have several books?
As-tu des livres ? Do you have any books?
Anyhow, you couldn’t use “de” alone like that either. “De” is ulways used before a noun with another determinant which will indicate if the noun is female or male. However, this will always mean “some”:
As-tu de la crème ? - female - Do you have some cream?
As-tu de l’eau? - female + contraction due to the vowel as first letter of following word - Do you have some water?
As-tu du café? - male - Do you have some coffee?
