What do Cornish miners, the Mayflower, the American Constitution, World War II, and rock ’n’ roll have in common? Cornwall!

In this 7th episode of Ink vs Algorithm, Mookie Spitz has tea with Bert Biscoe—Cornish poet, songwriter, historian, former mayor of Truro, and cultural force of nature—for a sweeping, deeply human conversation about history, language, power, and poetry.

Biscoe dismantles the naive American understanding of Cornwall (not just hens) and rebuilds it as a hidden engine of Western history:
• the Cornish pit stop that supplied the Mayflower and helped shape American governance
• the miners and engineers who powered the Industrial Revolution and modern warfare
• the cultural crossroads where Celtic identity, metal, and maritime trade converged
• the American troops who transformed Cornwall during WWII—bringing jazz, technology, and flush toilets

From there, the discussion turns inward and personal. Biscoe traces his own evolution from rebellious teenage blues guitarist to poet-politician. He explores the uneasy but powerful alliance between art and public service, and why poetry is not a luxury but a tool: a form of pastoral care, persuasion, and meaning-making.

Their chat then draws a sharp line between the art of persuasion and the racket of manipulation. Through Bert’s lens, figures like Barack Obama represent a tradition of rhetorical responsibility—language used to elevate, clarify, and move people toward shared purpose—while politicians such as Donald Trump embody its corrupted twin: speech designed to provoke, dominate, and extract attention rather than understanding. The distinction isn’t partisan, but poetic. One treats language as a civic duty, while the other treats it as a blunt instrument. And the difference, Biscoe argues, determines whether public speech builds societies or corrodes them.

Along the way, you’ll hear:

• Why poets, politicians, priests, and physicians all do versions of the same job
• How language creates influence long after formal power fades
• Why poets don’t belong in garrets—and never really did
• A live poetry reading and an unfiltered look at Biscoe’s daily writing practice
• A sharp critique of literary elitism and creative gatekeeping

Their conversation is part history lesson, part manifesto, part fireside rant, and is rooted in Cornwall, aimed at anyone who cares about words, culture, and how ideas actually move people. If you think poetry is irrelevant, politics is soulless, or history is settled, then this conversation will correct you.

The Poet

Bert Biscoe is a Cornish poet, songwriter, local historian, playwright, and former Mayor of Truro, best known for his work rooted in Cornish identity, language, politics, and cultural activism. A bard of the Cornish Gorsedh with the bardic name Viajor Gans Geryow, he has published several books of verse and prose — including Maudlin’ Pilgrimage, Rebecca (1996), The Dance of the Cornish Air (1996), At a Wedding with Yeats in Turin (2003), Trurra (winner of a Waterstones award at the Holyer an Gof Publishers’ Awards 2012), Words of Granite, On Yer Trolley: Poems Made During Complete Bed Rest! (2008), and White Crusted Eyes: Tales of Par (2009) — and performs widely across Cornwall. A long-time independent councillor on Cornwall Council and later Truro City Council, he’s also chaired local heritage groups, written on Cornish history, and regularly performs poetry and songs that blend local political commentary with folk tradition.

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What happens when a retired logistics expert decides to write a historical murder mystery set at the most politically unstable moment in late-medieval England?

In this episode of Ink vs. Algorithm, Mookie Spitz talks with British author and comics veteran Mark Oldroyd about The Chamberlain’s Gambit, a fast-paced historical novel set in 1484, the final full year of Richard III’s reign and the dying embers of the War of the Roses. The book blends murder, political intrigue, and lived medieval texture—without drowning in costume drama or faux-Shakespearean fluff.

Oldroyd walks through how the novel came to life: choosing a real historical vacuum to insert a fictional detective, grounding the story in real villages and castles that still exist today, and balancing accuracy with narrative momentum. The conversation ranges from Richard III, the Princes in the Tower, and collapsing institutions, to why historical fiction inevitably reflects modern anxieties about power, legitimacy, and populism.

The discussion also tackles a topic writers can’t avoid anymore: AI. Oldroyd is blunt about how he used it—and how he didn’t. No ghostwriting. No plot generation. Just disciplined research assistance and copy-editing, the same way writers once used libraries, index cards, and paid researchers. The result is a novel driven by human judgment, character, and consequence—not algorithmic paste.

They also take a candid look at the writing life after mid-career: finishing the damn book, surviving brutal beta readers, deciding between agents and self-publishing, and building a series without romantic illusions about fame or fortune.

If you care about:

• Historical fiction that actually moves
• Writing craft without mysticism
• AI as a tool, not a crutch
• Power, legitimacy, and why history keeps rhyming

This one’s for you! Turning curious? Mark Oldroyd is currently seeking early readers and reviewers for The Chamberlain’s Gambit.

The Writer

I started collecting comics at age 10 or 11, that's 55 years ago! There were some big gaps for romance and kids... Started again in COVID, and decided to start selling to fund the hobby. Suddenly Comics has been going for about 3 years, with my main selling being on Whatnot and at the London Comic Mart.

During the pandemic I also started producing videos about comics for YouTube, and I have a popular channel with over 2,000 subscribers. Here is the link https://www.youtube.com/@SuddenlyComics

His Novel

The Chamberlain's Gambit is my first novel, a Historical Murder Mystery. In 1484 the War of the Roses have left England scarred and suspicious. When the staunchly Yorkist Lord of Bardfield is found dead with an arrow through his eye, the fragile peace of the region threatens to shatter. Robert Stone, a war weary chamberlain loyal to the Duke of Norfolk, is dispatched to uncover the killer. He expects to find a Lancastrian plot,, but the truth is far more personal, and far more dangerous. The roots of the murder lie decades in the past.

His Contact

Email: mark@suddenlycomics.com
Instagam: @suddenlycomics
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mark.oldroyd.507
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@SuddenlyComics

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This episode of The Writers' Pod drops you right into the mix: ideology, apostasy, 9/11, the collapse of the New Atheist movement, and the cultural schizophrenia of post-Trump America — all through the lived experience of Ali A. Rizvi, author of The Atheist Muslim and one of the few writers who actually paid the personal price for blasphemy in the 2010s.

Over a sprawling, brutally candid and uproariously funny conversation, Ali and host Mookie Spitz trace the decade-long arc of Ali’s book: from its birth in the shadow of ISIS and the Charlie Hebdo killings to its strange afterlife in a world drowning in misinformation, outrage porn, and algorithmic noise. Ali explains, without irony, what it meant to grow up secular-minded in Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, and how 9/11 ripped open the fault line between “Islam the ideology” and “Muslims the people.”

You’ll hear:

• How the book blindsided both sides — the Western right that wanted to criminalize Muslims, and the Western left that infantilized them.
• Why separating humans from their doctrines matters now more than ever.
• How the internet accidentally secularized an entire generation, from Tehran to Karachi to Toronto.
• Why co-opting a religion terrifies fundamentalists more than leaving it.
• Why the atheist movement blew its shot by selling rationality and ignoring meaning.
• How Trump beat the Enlightenment with a story, not an argument.
• Why “making secularism sexy” isn’t optional — it’s survival.
• Why the human brain is (isn't!) a sophisticated LLM.

And of course they can't help themselves, going all the way into the weeds: Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, the Muslim ban, Obama’s shockwave election, ISIS fanboys, Woody Allen as the archetype of the secular Jew, Busy Beaver numbers as quasi-religious ecstasy, Denmark cartoons, Middle Eastern censorship, and how long-term memory might be the evolutionary engine behind humanity’s obsession with meaning.

If you want polite NPR babble, this isn’t your show. If you want a raw, historically grounded, intellectually vicious tour through religion, identity, polarization, free speech, and the strange new world where everyone’s shouting but no one knows a damn thing, then welcome to the fifth installment of Ink vs. Algorithm.

The Guest

Ali A. Rizvi is a writer, physician, and musician. He is the author of “The Atheist Muslim: A Journey from Religion to Reason," and host of the Unlicensed Therapist podcast, and all-round sh*t disturber.

His Book

His Podcast

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In this episode of Ink vs Algorithm: The Writers' Pod, Mookie Spitz sits down with poet and healthcare strategist Hudson Plumb, whose new collection The Art of Undoing (Finishing Line Press) has already become a bestseller. Their conversation revolves around rediscovery: how creativity can go dormant for decades, only to reignite when life strips you down to what matters.

Plumb recounts his journey from promising young poet to full-time professional and father who stopped writing entirely for twenty-five years. Then came the pandemic: Zoom marathons, cabin fever, and a sudden need for meaning. From that isolation, he picked up his pen again. What followed was a renaissance: reworking poems he’d written in his twenties, submitting to journals, enduring rejection after rejection, and finally breaking through with several publications and winning a 2024 Founders’ Prize in RHINO Poetry for his poem “The Son.”

Spitz and Plumb discuss how poetry sits at the intersection of music and thought, why ambiguity makes verse more alive, and how the best writing thrives in the tension between control and surrender.

• The Art of Undoing: How “undoing” — loss, reflection, and humility — can be a creative act in itself.
• Poetry’s Second Act: Why Plumb believes poetry is quietly resurging as the short-form art of our crisis age, and a return to lyricism in a time of noise.orm and Feeling:
• The influence of Lawrence Raab’s poetry class at Williams College, and how one comma in Frost’s Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening changed how he reads every line.
• From Fatherhood to Freedom: How family, healthcare work, and grief deepened his writing rather than silenced it.
• The Discipline of the Weekend Poet: Why Hudson writes in intense weekend bursts, like “assembling a watch blindfolded,” until the poem suddenly “starts to tick.”
• The Poems: He reads several, including Vancouver Island Whale Watch, The Largest Thing, and The Son which exploring life, death, and renewal through precise imagery and emotional depth.

The Guest

Hudson Plumb is a poet, playwright, and healthcare communications strategist based in New York City. His poetry has recently appeared in Humana Obscura (Issue 12), RHINO Poetry (2024 Founders’ Prize, Runner-Up), The Courtship of Winds, and Kaleidoscope Magazine, Exploring the Experience of Disability Through Literature and the Fine Arts. His poems have also been published in earlier issues of Webster Review, Missouri, and Kaleidoscope.

The poems in The Art of Undoing guide through the strange, luminous terrain of what remains after separation—and what may take its place. While tracing a path through personal and collective tragedies, these poems remain attuned to the beauty that appears unexpectedly: a whale surfacing beside a boat, “clouds passing/between the fingers of a eucalyptus tree,” cormorants “popping up with sideways prizes.” Rather than retreat from the brokenness of the world, Plumb’s lyric meditations gather its fragments into forms of quiet restoration. In scenes shaped by a father’s death in Argentina, a mother blinking glass from her eye in a Sagaponack storm, or hermit crabs crawling toward improbable survival, Plumb reveals undoing not only as loss, but as the possibility of pause and renewal.

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In this episode of Ink vs Algorithm: The Writers' Pod, Mookie sits down with TH Forest, the author of Twinkies and Beefcake, Descendants of the Gods, and the Matt & Ollie queer romance saga to explore the strange alchemy of fan fiction, grief, and desire that birthed her career as one of the most fearless indie voices in male/male romance.

Forest didn’t plan to write MM love stories. What started as Supernatural-inspired fiction during the lockdown spiraled into a universe of its own, blending gods, demons, and closeted Navy SEALs with tenderness, danger, and unapologetic sexuality. Her work walks the tightrope between lust and love, myth and reality, the sacred and the profane. All done without a single line written by AI.

Mookie and TH dig into the cultural underbelly of writing queer intimacy, from the politics of sex positivity to the psychology of why so many straight women devour gay romance. They talk about growing up conservative, discovering queer spaces as sanctuaries, and channeling loss into liberation through storytelling. Along the way, they hit every corner of the creative process, from editing 300,000-word drafts down to something publishable, surviving #BookTok’s noise, and the daily, grinding hustle of being your own publisher, marketer, and community builder.

At the core of her passion lurks the ghost of Tom Holdorf, THs late cousin and a 1990s New York fashion photographer lost to AIDS. His legacy of art, defiance, and beauty runs through every page she writes, and every author she hopes to lift through Holdorf Press, her indie imprint dedicated to real, human storytelling in an age of artifice.

Their conversation is messy, candid, and moving — a love letter to writers who dare to tell the stories they’re not “supposed” to tell.

Highlights

• How fan fiction led to a queer literary universe
• Sex positivity, censorship, and the ethics of erotic storytelling
• The legacy of loss: honoring an artist taken by AIDS
• BookTok for grownups — why relationship > reach
• Indie publishing secrets: ISBN protection, IngramSpark, and live events
• How AI-free creativity is an act of rebellion

The Guest

TH Forest lives in Massachusetts with her husband, sons, cats, Major Tom & Bowie, her German Shepherd, Freya, and one very loud macaw, Loki. She loves to cook, read, and listen to all genres of music (except country) and is passionate about the things that matter to her, like representation, inclusivity, and being an LGBTQ+ ally. She is also a shameless promoter of her novels and is happy to talk your ear off about them.

Holdorf Press

Website & Social Channels

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Welcome to Ink vs Algorithm: The Writers' Pod, a conversational laboratory where the creative mind and the digital machine collide. Hosted by Mookie Spitz, a novelist, podcaster, and manic ranter, this show dissects what it means to write, publish, and survive as an artist in the algorithmic age. Each episode showcases writers, thinkers, and creative bon vivants to explore the tension between raw human imagination and the cold precision of AI.

In the flagship episode, Mookie sits down with Julianne Webb — writer, opera singer, and daughter of Ziggy cartoonist Tom Wilson — to unpack a life steeped in creativity, chaos, and litigation. From growing up in a greeting-card empire to navigating family dysfunction, lawsuits, and a legacy of art and humor, Webb’s story is a masterclass in artistic survival.

Their conversation veers from the 1970s suburbs to the frontlines of digital storytelling. Listen in for deep dives into process, mental health, memoir, and meaning — plus plenty of tangents involving baldness, babysitting certificates, rotary phones, and opera arias.

What They Cover

• Creative lineage: Growing up the daughter of Ziggy creator Tom Wilson and a writer mother who was part of the design team for Strawberry Shortcake, Care Bears, and Holly Hobbie
• Art & dysfunction: The beautiful chaos of a creative family that loved, fought, drank, and eventually sued each other
• Childhood in the 70s: Rotary phones, Schwinn bikes, babysitting certificates, and pre-digital independence
• The lost art of growing up: What kids today miss without streetlights, landlines, and neighborhood tribes
• Writer’s block & imposter syndrome: Finding validation and courage through writing groups and creative community
• Memoir vs. fiction: The blurred line between lived experience and art — exploring roman à clef storytelling
• Acting and authorship: How opera performance informs writing — embodying characters and directing emotion
• The tortured artist myth: Why struggle, madness, and pressure can fuel creativity
• The publishing grind: The unfiltered reality of self-publishing, marketing, and the social media hustle
• TikTok epiphany: Going viral, getting hate, and learning that engagement beats perfection
• Creative risk & controversy: The backlash that follows provocation — and why it’s worth it
• The core writing philosophy: Eliminate pretense, abandon ego, and — in Mookie’s words — “STFU and let your story tell itself.”

The Guest

Julianne Webb is a classically trained singer, instructor of voice and piano, mom, wife, knitter, and writer currently residing north of Cincinnati. Her new memoir spans decades and chronicles such heady experiences as familial chaos, emotional thrill rides and questionable parenting, as well as fat farms, pennyfarthings, talking parrots, boarding school, culottes and serial killers. She sincerely hopes you will follow her on socials, listen to Mookie’s podcasts and buy Famous Father, Unknown Daughter, slated for release in May 2026.

Her Socials

TikTok

Instagram

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Welcome to Ink vs Algorithm: The Writers' Pod, where flesh-and-blood writers face off against the machine age. Hosted by Mookie Spitz, himself a novelist, blogger, and ranter, this show dives headfirst into the creative chaos of 2025: an era where everyone’s consuming content, yet fewer seem to care who actually made it.

Each episode brings conversations with his fellow writers, journalists, novelists, publicists, creators, and discerning readers fighting to keep human storytelling alive in a world flooded by AI-generated slop. From the craft of writing to the crisis of attention, from the beauty of language to the blunt reality that most online words are now written by code, Ink vs Algorithm asks the only question that matters: Can the human voice still cut through the noise?

Whether you’re a writer using AI as a research tool or a reader trying to tell real from synthetic, the podcast is irreverent, and unapologetically human.

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