Here's an interview I did about the writing of Ireland in 2050.

When did the idea for your book first come to you?

The idea for the book came after my second son was born. I became a little obsessed with the type of Ireland he and his older brother might end up seeing, and read widely around the topic of Ireland’s future, looking at reports, blogs, the usual. On August 6, 2008, I wrote an article for the Irish Times, called ‘What will life be like for a middle class family in 2050?’ It took off from there.

What attracted you to the topic of your latest book?

The fact is that many of us will see 2050, but we don’t discuss our long-term economic, social, and cultural issues in this context. We act like today, this year, this part of the business cycle, and this political set of circumstances are all that there is. While we have urgent challenges to face, Ireland has more important issues which need to be addressed, like climate change, sustaining our living standards when there are more older people in society than younger people, and educating our children in the right way so as not to damage their creativity.

How long did it take you to write?

About 11 weeks. After one day spent hacking out a premise in October 2008, I wrote for 1 week in January of 2009, then for all of June, July, and 2 weeks of August this year. Ireland in 2050 came out on September 28^th.

How much research would you prepare before beginning to write a book?

For Ireland in 2050, I think I read about 70 books, and my files for the book, written in a program called Scrivener, which is a brilliant program, it keeps all your drafts and your research in one place, shows 473 pdfs of reports by governments and agencies, blog posts, data sets, and scanned in scribbles from my notebook. But I didn’t read all these before writing the book—most of the material I went looking for as the need arose when writing a chapter.

What do you find the most challenging aspect of writing?

Rewriting. I tend to have an idea, quickly write a lot, and then send it off too soon. This is a mistake. Often my work needs a cold eye, and I tend to bounce around a lot within my own head while writing. Sometimes this bouncing around makes its way onto a page, which is not a good thing. You don’t want the reader to have too erratic a reading experience, or they will get exasperated and throw a shoe at you one day when you’re doing a reading!

Was there any aspect that surprised you the most?

The sheer lack of a coherent notion that Ireland is going to be here in 40 years, that there are real problems we can start finding solutions to now, that government agencies have lockers full of plans, but the political will does not exist to implement any of these plans. That surprised me the most about the context for the book. What surprised me most about writing Ireland in 2050 is how easy it was. I love thinking this way, and writing the book was a joy. Most of my writing is for a technical audience. When writing, say, an academic paper, you’ve to be balanced, remove all emotion, cut to the quick of an idea. With a popular book like Ireland in 2050, I was free to be as unbalanced as I could think of, as long as my points were always backed by the best evidence I could find. So that deliberate imbalance was a liberty, and one I took repeatedly. Ireland in 2050 is not an academic piece. It’s written to start a row.

What are the best conditions for writing?

There aren’t any. You have a job to do. Get a computer, a notebook, a seat, a table, an Internet connection. Sit down. Write.

The barriers you must overcome as a writer are mostly psychological. You worry that you will produce a shitty first draft. Well, you will. That’s what editing is for. You worry that your work is mediocre, derivative, and boring. It is, that’s what editing is for. You worry your book won’t make money. Chances are incredibly high your book won’t make money. If you want to make money in a more guaranteed way, get a second job stuffing envelopes on your kitchen table, then spend the money you’ve just earned on lotto tickets. This is a surer procedure to make you money than writing a book. Most books vanish without a trace, at least in the eyes of the market. So don’t worry about not making money: assume you won’t. You worry about inspiration. No such thing. Work out a plan, try as best you can to stick to that plan. Word counts matter. Try for between 400 and 600 words a day, every day. If you work at it 7 days a week, as I did while writing the book, you’ll usually write much more. Don’t avoid distraction. Keep that Internet on, keep the browser going, twitter on, all that. But don’t go near them for 20 minutes. Assuming you can type pretty quickly, you’ll produce 200-300 words in those 20 minutes. You’re halfway there. Now go for a browse, answer email, research that point. But this is crucial: return to the 300 words you still owe yourself. Fill in those blanks you left while writing the first 300 words with your web research (“Research by XY has shown that XY people die every XY seconds”: stuff like that), and finish off the 300 words. You’ve 600 words down. Now, those are probably 600 shite words, with maybe two decent paragraphs in there. But the two good paragraphs can be expanded tomorrow. Or today, if you feel like it. Print out your work today. Re-read what you’ve written. Read your work aloud. When it sounds stupid to your ear, that’s when it’s time to do some editing. Edit, and make your work better. That’s all there is to it. Most books are 60,000 words or so, meaning you’ll crack out a book a year on average at that rate. Don’t forget you’ll have days when you write 3,000 words too. But keep at it and you’ll finish. It helps to have an editor asking you for pages too!

Do you picture the reader when writing your books?

Yes. My reader is someone who asks questions, who gets upset by the world they see around them a lot, who is interested in understanding their world, and who has no time for jargon, just for jargon’s sake.

Are you ever worried about the reaction to your books will be like?

Yes, very worried. At one level, writing a book is like asking the world to judge you. Your ideas, your story, your life’s work, whatever they are, all get condensed into ink on a page without context. You can’t explain ‘what you meant’ to a reader: they have to pick up everything you wanted them to understand about you from your words. That is very hard. Potential readers will pick your book up, think about whether your book’s central idea is a good one, and most will drop the book, because, simply, it isn’t good enough to excite them to buy and read it. There are those who do give you their valuable attention for several hours of their lives, who end up hating your book. That reaction really worries me, much more than people not bothering to read at all. But luckily all the reviews so far of Ireland in 2050 are very positive.

Are you working on a book now?

Yes, two books. One is a big academic piece on an area of research called computable economics. Another is an edited volume on constructive solutions to the current crisis. I’m thinking about another popular book for this time next year, based around the idea of economic isolation, and maybe a short textbook for one of my classes at UL.

What, as an author, do you see as your biggest responsibility?

To tell an engaging story, backed by the facts, which gets the reader thinking about their lives in a different way.

In regards to your writing, did you have much encouragement in your early days?

Yes, I’ve a very supportive and understanding wife, and two beautiful and expensive children to pay for. I’ve also got great colleagues at the Kemmy Business School, who let me wreck their heads on a daily basis about this stuff.

What was the last book you read?

Keynes: The Return of the Master, by Robert Skidelsky.

In this genre which authors do you particularly recommend or enjoy?

I love anything written about economics, but the best economics book I’ve read in years is the The Idea of Justice, by Amartya Sen.

What advice would you give to anyone trying to write or publish their work?

Just start. If your subject engages you when you don’t like it very much, then you’ll finish. Don’t allow yourself to stop until it is really, really done. Don’t write books to make money. Write them to educate yourself about something you care about, and write to be read.

If you were heading on your holidays in the next week what book or books would you bring?

I’d bring Matt Cooper’s Who really runs Ireland, and Michael O’Sullivan’s Ireland and the Global Question. I’ve read O’Sullivan’s book 3 times, and each time I re-read it, I get more out of it.