これ誰の本ですか？

Sentence Discussions Japanese
#1

Wouldn’t it just be, "誰の本ですか?” How does the '’これ’ at the beginning change the meaning?

#2
English Translation

Whose book is this?

I would translate "誰の本ですか? as “Whose book is it?”, it is not necessarily “this” book.

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#3

これは誰の本ですか？ is the full standard form, meaning “whose book is this?” In a casual conversation, we sometimes omit the particle は. But we usually insert 、(読点) between これ and 誰 in a casual writing when the particle is omitted.

You can further shorten it in 誰の本ですか？ by dropping the whole subject これは. The difference in this case is not between casual and formal, but it makes the sentence vague as @mike-lima explained. So, 誰の本ですか？ is “whose book?” You may want to say 誰の本ですか？ when the listener cannot see the book in a close distance. It’s pretty much the same as English.

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