I get up very early - usually 5.30 or 6 a.m. - because I write before I go to work in the Guardian. I'll work through until about 10am and then get into work at around 10.45 a.m. I sometimes work in the evenings, too, but if I do that it's a different kind of writing. I do the arithmetic grind of the plot in the mornings when I'm fresher, and the more rhapsodic pieces in the evening. I don't eat in the mornings. I get straight into work with a cup of coffee. It's a nice time, all on your own when the thoughts of the day have not yet descended. I work in a room - you could call it a study - in my flat in Islington. It's an old-fashioned, book-lined room except for the fact that the bookshelves are those black metal bolted ones. Although it's really for reasons of economy - because I have so many books - it's perhaps a good thing: it makes me get on with it. Ideally I would write in an empty room, but it's nice to have your books around you.
I don't really aim for a word-count each day - I just stop when I'm running late.
I don't have any rituals but I have accumulated some things in the study, including a copy of Graham Greene's The Heart of the Matter on the window shelf. Originally it just happened to be there for no reason, although I do think it's a great book. It's still there, though, and now it's all yellowed by the sun. To me it's like a mark of the physical side of writing. People forget what a really physical thing writing is - you're struggling with this machine.
I write on a computer, but a rather old-fashioned one. It just has word-processing, not loads of gimmicks. I don't have the Internet or bells and whistles - distractions on your machine are fatal.
I tend to edit passages as I go. My first novel, The Last King of Scotland, took six drafts and the second, Ladysmith, took three; it depends, really. Mostly the editing takes the form of taking things out. The first novel took about six years to write, while the second only took a year. If you focus, you can get a lot done. It's the time before you sit down to write that's important. That's when you plan and allow the themes to reveal themselves. The actual process is just hard work, really.
I go to Ireland to write if I need peace and quiet - my mother is from there and we have a cottage in West Cork near J.G. Farrell's place. When I write in Ireland, it's different - like early-morning writing only it goes on all day. I think I'll move to Ireland one day.
I find ex-girlfriends are the best critics. They know my weaknesses only too well, and as these tend to come out in my prose, they can tell me which things should come out. When I'm actually writing I find my romantic life goes into free-fall. I work in the Guardian all day, so nightwriting is a form of switching off. Nowadays I tend not to drink booze when I'm actually writing, just strong black coffee - like Balzac. Most of the time the balance between journalism and writing is fine, as they're such very different things.
When I was between books, I physically cleaned my computer. When you spend so much time in front of it, it gets covered in ash and dust and spilt coffee. It was a disaster because I poured soapy water between the keys and had to get a new one. People tend to forget that the local is so important when you're writing - what you're thinking or feeling or seeing at the time comes out in your work.
(In conversation with Louise East)
Giles Foden's new novel, Ladysmith, is published by Faber and Faber at £9.99 in the UK