Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Me and Carlos | 2020 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 2 | The Tomorrow Box | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 3 | The Summer House | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 4 | Crewelwork | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 5 | Rewards | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 6 | Simplexity | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 7 | I Would Be Doing This Anyway | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
| 8 | If You Are Lonely and You Know It | 2021 | Yiyun Li | Buy |
Currency is a series of eight short works by Yiyun Li published in 2020-2021. The entries — including Me and Carlos (2020), The Tomorrow Box (2021), and Simplexity (2021) — are short literary pieces exploring Li’s characteristic themes of connection, solitude, and memory.
Li is an acclaimed novelist and short story writer whose longer works include The Vagrants (2009) and Where Reasons End (2019). The Currency project released these eight pieces in a serialized format, with each one standing alone while sharing Li’s precise prose style. Titles like Crewelwork, Rewards, and If You Are Lonely and You Know It give a sense of the emotional range.
The series is a good way for readers who already know Li’s novels to encounter her in a more compact form. For those new to her work, the short length of each Currency entry makes them accessible starting points before moving on to her full-length fiction.