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My son and I were in the car.

He wanted to go to the library to return the books.

"You haven't finished reading the books."

"You haven't finished reading these books."

I told him.

The books were at home.

As the context above, I should use "the" or "these"?

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    If the books were at home, 'those' could be used IMO.
    – dan
    Commented Oct 22, 2017 at 0:44
  • "the books" could also be used to refer to the books in question, that is, to the ones parent and child knew were in the process of being read.
    – Gustavson
    Commented Oct 22, 2017 at 1:03

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It should be either

"the books [you are talking about]"

or

"those books [that you left at home],"

but it would not be "these books" unless you mean

"these books [that you're talking about],"

which I don't think is what you mean.

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