What is the significance of Z-transform?
First of all, I think you're reading the wrong books. Almost any basic text on DSP has a chapter on the $\mathcal{Z}$-transform and its significance to describe linear time-invariant (LTI) discrete-time systems. If you're looking for good (and free) books, take a look at this answer.

I will not repeat all the details you can find in those books (and in many other places), but let me just point out a few very basic things to get you started. Each (single) pole $p$ of the transfer function $H(z)$ of a causal LTI discrete-time system contributes a term

$$c\cdot p^nu[n]\tag{1}$$

to the system's impulse response, where $c$ is some constant, $p$ is the (possibly complex) pole, and $u[n]$ is the discrete-time unit step function. From (1) it is clear that this contribution only decays with time if $|p|&lt;1$. So for a causal system to be stable we require that all the poles of the transfer function are inside the unit circle of the complex plane, i.e. they have magnitudes smaller than $1$. So if you're looking for analogies with the Laplace transform, the inside of the unit circle corresponds to the left half plane of the complex variable $s$. Furthermore, the unit circle of the $z$-plane corresponds to the $j\omega$-axis. Knowing these two things, it becomes very easy to carry over everything you know about transfer functions of continuous-time systems (Laplace transform) to the discrete-time domain ($\mathcal{Z}$-transform).