The accusative case: nouns

The accusative case (винительный падеж) is mainly used for direct objects (nouns or pronouns that go directly after a verb, without a preposition). Please, note, that there're some other usages that I'm not going to cover in this lesson.

Examples:

Я читаю книгу (I'm reading a book).

Аня любит яблоки. (Ann likes apples).

Игорь пишет письмо. (Igor is writing a letter).

"Книгу", "яблоки", "письмо" are the examples of the accusatve case.

The choice of the ending depends if the noun is masculine, feminine or neuter; singular or plural; animate or inanimate.

Inanimate nouns are things. Animate nouns are people or animals. I'm going to tell you about the endings of  inanimate nouns first.

INANIMATE  NOUNS

Look carefully at the following examples:

Я люблю рис (I like rice). 

"Рис" is masculine. As you can see, the ending doesn't change for masculine nouns in the accusative case.

Анна любит молоко (Anna likes milk).

"Молоко" is neuter. The ending doesn't change for neuter nouns either.

Мы не любим яблоки (We don't like apples).

"Яблоки" is plural. The ending doesn't change for plural nouns.

Easy, isn't it? However, there's an exception, and it concerns feminine nouns:

Я люблю колбасу (I like sausage).

"Колбаса" becomes "колбасу".  So the ending changes for feminine nouns in the accusative case: "а" changes into "у".

For feminine nouns that end in "я", "я" changes into "ю".

Я вижу лилию (I can see a lily): лилия - лилию

In a nutshell:

Feminine nouns: а - у; я - ю

Masculine nouns: no change

Neuter nouns: no change

Plurals: no change

Now you can do this exercise to practice.