Question

Complete the sentence with the suitable phrase from the options
What kind of books _______?
(A) does Mary likes
(B) Mary likes
(C) Mary like
(D) does Mary like

Answer 1

Hint: Read the given question along with each of the options in the blank, repeat this a few times to get a hint at which options can be eliminated. So when we see the options we need to decide between two things; if we require a ‘does’ and if we use ‘like’ or ‘likes’ in the right answer. To decide between this, remember that the format to make a question out of a sentence is this;
 Wh-Question word + auxiliary verb + subject + actual verb?

Complete answer:
When we look at the sentence a couple of times we can see that it is of this form;
Wh-Question word + auxiliary verb + subject + actual verb?
Now if we try to convert this sentence to its affirmative, we see that there is no helping verb, but the format of the sentence requires one. So automatically ‘do’ would act as the auxiliary verb. Now since we are talking about ‘Mary’ who is in the third person singular form, we convert ‘do’ and use ‘does’.
Now to decide on whether the verb is ‘like’ or ‘likes’, we know that in the affirmative form, with a singular subject the verb takes plural form but in the interrogative, the verb is singular for a singular subject, so here naturally we use ‘like’ with ‘does Mary’.

Taking options (a), (b) and (c) we know that they all defy the above conditions. Option (a) is incorrect since in the interrogative form this is grammatically wrong. Option (b) is incorrect, clearly because it violates the format of the question; similarly option (c) follows the wrong format.

But option (d) does Mary like; is the correct option since it follows the format correctly as well as there is the required subject-verb agreement. The right statement is What kind of books does Mary like?

Thus the correct answer is option ‘D’.

Note: The verb ‘do’ is quite tricky and so it is hard to pick when we must use ‘do’ or ‘does’ for a given statement. Let us sort out where we make use of the verb ‘do’ and ‘does’;
- The verb ‘do’ is generally used with the subjects: ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘they’ or ‘we’.
- While the verb ‘does’ is used when it is with subjects: ‘it’, ’he’ or ‘she’.
- Also either of them are used when questions which take ‘yes’ or ‘no’ as answers.
- This same format of usage can be followed if the sentence is affirmative or interrogative.
- There is another word that is used in the past tense, it is ‘did’.