BOOKSHELF NOTES – Continuing our Techies With Sidelines series.

Meet Anthony Hontoir – a documentary filmmaker and cameraman who has been running Downwood Films in South Wales for the past 37 years. Before that, he spent nine years as a freelance journalist, specialising in woodwork.

With retirement from filmmaking on the horizon, Anthony turned his hand to crime fiction. He created Erwin Graham, a former Fleet Street crime reporter who, after suffering a breakdown, relocates to Devon to become an artist—and an amateur sleuth.

His debut novel, The Tidal Road Mystery (2016), introduces Erwin and his gipsy partner, Belle, as they help a new neighbour—retired cameraman Godfrey Sanderson—who finds himself accused of murder shortly after moving into the area.

This was followed by The Seagull Bay Mystery, the second book in the Erwin Graham series, published in May 2025 by Downwood Books. Both novels are written in the classic style of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, while being set in contemporary times. Though fictional, Anthony draws heavily from his own experiences in journalism and filmmaking.

For readers in South Wales, copies of the books are available in Anthony’s hometown of Porthcawl at Sussed (James Street) and at the Porthcawl Museum (John Street).

For those farther afield, more information and purchase options are available on the Downwood Films website.

https://downwoodfilms.com/product-category/books/the-erwin-graham-series/