Money: The True Story of a Made-Up Thing

If you enjoyed the “Planet Money” podcast, this book will be right up your alley. It's got the same breezy style, going off on tangents that turn out not to be so tangential after all. It's a quick read, but the “Notes” at the back look to be rich source of further reading material.

“The essence of finance is time travel.” (quoting Matt Levine)

Counterfeiting money is as old as money :-)