Running From Office

An unflinching insight into the role of a government minister, sharing with searing honesty the personal and political cost when ambition and idealism clash with reality.

'A wonderfully engaging, honest and witty portrait of the humiliations, idealism, nobility and banality of democratic life' - Rory Stewart, author of Politics on the Edge

'Wryly self-deprecating, but also informative and illuminating' - Matt Cooper

As Ireland's Minister for Housing, Eoghan Murphy took on one of the toughest briefs in government, one that continues to be a challenge today. Looking back at his life in the build-up to parliamentary office and at his time in the cabinet, Eoghan brings a self-lacerating and deeply personal view of the life of a modern politician trying - and often failing - to make the positive change he hoped to deliver. Brutal and sometimes harrowing, Eoghan's tale is also surprisingly funny, though the humour is only ever at the author's expense.

If, in the end, all political careers end in failure, why didn't anyone tell the author that? There are no heroes or villains here, just a person facing their own limitations as they navigate the unfamiliar world of campaigns, elected office and government responsibility.

Bringing refreshing candour to the pressures and absurdity of politics, this book shows us who our politicians really are when there's nothing left to spin and no one there to spin it to.