‘I thought I hallucinated Roddy Doyle’s email’

"Roddy Doyle contacted me and I thought I must have swine flu again because when I had it in 2007 I was actually hallucinating, so I thought it was happening again," says illustrator and comedian Aoife Dooley.

“He said that he loved my work and that it reminded him of why he loved Dublin. That just made me forget every nasty thing anyone had ever said to me,” she tells Róisín Ingle, on the latest Róisín Meets podcast.

Dooley’s work centres on her affectionate parodies of fiery working-class Dublin women, which are informed by her own experiences growing up on the northside of the city and started out as a web series before her first book How to be Massive was published.

Its central character is the irrepressible Nikita who is never seen without her “hun bun”, dresses head to toe in Penny’s gear and loves a good spice-bag. She is back in Dooley’s latest book, How to Deal with Poxes.

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A pox is “someone who opens a filthy chicken fillet roll beside you first thing in the morning or somebody you work with who corners you in a conversation about their children for half an hour,” Dooley explains.

Everyone has a bit of pox in them though and not even she is safe from accusations of acting the pox, with her 72-year-old “nana who’s on Facebook” constantly calling her out for being one.

Also on the podcast, Dooley speaks about growing up in Dublin, the lasting impact that being bullied throughout her childhood has had on her life, where to get the best spice-bag in Dublin, and lots more.

You can find all our podcasts on www.irishtimes.com/podcasts

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