Mistä löydän tämän kirjan?

Mistä means from where or where from.

In this sentence, Finnish uses mistä in a way that corresponds to English Where can I find... ? Even though English just says where, Finnish often uses from where with the verb löytää in this kind of question.

Compare:

• Missä on kirja? = Where is the book?
• Mistä löydän kirjan? = Where can I find the book?

So:

• missä = where, in/at where
• mistä = from where

This is just the natural Finnish pattern with löytää in many contexts.

Löydän comes from the verb löytää, which means to find.

Here it is in the 1st person singular present tense:

• minä löydän = I find / I will find
• in context: I can find / I’ll find

The ending -n marks I.

A few forms:

• löydän = I find
• löydät = you find
• löytää = he/she finds
• löydämme = we find
• löydätte = you all find
• löytävät = they find

Finnish often leaves out the pronoun minä, because the verb ending already shows the subject. So löydän by itself already means I find.

Because this book is the object of the verb find, and in Finnish that changes its form.

The basic dictionary forms are:

• tämä = this
• kirja = book

But in the sentence Mistä löydän tämän kirjan?, the speaker is talking about finding the whole book, as a complete result. Finnish usually marks that with the total object form.

So:

• tämä kirja = this book
• tämän kirjan = this book (as the object here)

That is why both words change.

Because in Finnish, words that belong together usually agree with each other.

Here tämä modifies kirja, so when the noun changes case, the demonstrative changes too.

• tämä kirja = this book
• tämän kirjan = this book (in this object form)

This kind of agreement is very common in Finnish:

• tuo talo = that house
• tuon talon = that house
• nämä kirjat = these books
• näiden kirjojen = of these books

So the change is not random: the modifier and the noun match.

This is a very common learner question, because the form looks like the genitive.

In a sentence like this, kirjan is usually explained as the form used for a total object in the singular. Historically and in practice, it looks the same as the genitive.

So in beginner materials, you may see explanations like:

• kirjan = genitive form
• or: kirjan = accusative/genitive-looking object form

The important practical point is this:

• löydän kirjan = I find the book / I will find the whole book
• luen kirjaa = I am reading a book / I’m reading the book, but the action is incomplete or ongoing

So here kirjan shows a complete object, not possession.

Finnish often does not use a separate word for can when English does.

Mistä löydän tämän kirjan? literally looks like From where do I find this book?, but the natural English meaning is Where can I find this book?

In many contexts, simple present tense in Finnish can sound like:

• Where do I find... ?
• Where can I find... ?
• Where will I find... ?

depending on the situation.

If you wanted to say can more explicitly, you could use voin:

• Mistä voin löytää tämän kirjan? = Where can I find this book?

That is also correct, but Mistä löydän tämän kirjan? is very natural and common.

Yes, Finnish word order is fairly flexible, but the basic order here is the most natural one.

Standard order:

• Mistä löydän tämän kirjan?

You could also hear or see other orders in special contexts, for example for emphasis, but they are less neutral.

The normal structure is:

• Mistä = question word first
• löydän = verb
• tämän kirjan = object

Putting the question word first is very common in Finnish questions.

The basic forms are:

• mistä → related question-word form meaning from where
• löydän → basic verb: löytää = to find
• tämän → basic form: tämä = this
• kirjan → basic form: kirja = book

So the sentence is built from:

• löytää = to find
• tämä kirja = this book

with the words changed to fit the grammar of the sentence.

In spoken Finnish, you might often hear:

• Mistä mä löydän tän kirjan?

Changes:

• minä → mä = I
• tämän → tän = this
• standard kirjan usually stays kirjan

So:

• Mistä löydän tämän kirjan? = standard written/spoken Finnish
• Mistä mä löydän tän kirjan? = common everyday spoken Finnish

Both mean the same thing.

A rough pronunciation guide for an English speaker:

• Mistä ≈ MIS-tah
• löydän ≈ something like LUH-y-dan, with ö pronounced somewhat like the vowel in British bird but with rounded lips
• tämän ≈ TAH-man
• kirjan ≈ KEER-yan

A few helpful points:

• ä is like the vowel in cat, but cleaner and shorter
• ö does not exist in standard English; it is a rounded front vowel
• j in Finnish sounds like English y
• stress is almost always on the first syllable:
  • MIStä
  • LÖYdän
  • TÄmän
  • KIRjan

So the rhythm is very regular: first syllable stressed in each word.

You might hear it sometimes, and people would probably understand you, but Mistä löydän tämän kirjan? is the more natural standard choice.

Why?

Because Finnish tends to use mistä with löytää in this kind of where can I find... question.

So for a learner, the safest natural pattern is:

• Mistä löydän... ? = Where can I find... ?

Use missä when you are asking where something is:

• Missä tämä kirja on? = Where is this book?