Money: The Fifth Element

*AS HEARD ON RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK* THE INTERNATIONAL #1 BESTSELLER SHORTLISTED FOR THE AN POST IRISH BOOK AWARDS 2024 NON-FICTION BOOK OF THE YEARA WATERSTONES NON-FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR 2024A 2024 BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE OBSERVER, ECONOMIST, FINANCIAL TIMES AND PROSPECT ‘A breathtaking, expansive and imaginative ride through the history and future of money from an author who truly understands it’ PROFESSOR BRIAN COX ‘Exceptional’ FINANCIAL TIMES ​‘A cracking book that is as enjoyable as it is readable’ PETER FRANKOPAN ‘Equally entertaining and insightful’ YANIS VAROUFAKIS _______________________________________________________MONEY.The object of our desires.The engine of our genius.Humanity’s greatest invention. From clay tablets in Mesopotamia to today’s cryptocurrency, global economist David McWilliams takes us on an epic journey of innovation, disruption and transformation that is an astonishing new history of our species. The question is, over 5,000 years, have we changed money – or has money changed us? _______________________________________________________ ‘A fun history of money told through the stories of the chancers, cheats, scoundrels and geniuses who made it happen’ KATIE MARTIN ‘An impressive journey that fizzes with facts’ ECONOMIST ‘An eye-opening history of what makes the world go round’ EVENING STANDARD ‘Compelling, funny and original’ KATJA HOYER ‘If, as David McWilliams complains, economists take the fun out of money, then he is the exception that proves the rule: a man who could not write a boring sentence if he tried’ TOM HOLLAND