To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

The real Salt Path: how the couple behind a bestseller le...

I read Raynor Winn's book The Salt Path and her other two books. I was looking forward to seeing the film at some point and to reading her next book. I felt sorry to read about the challenges the couple had faced, especially with regard to losing their family home and with Moth's health. Now, having read the article in today's Observer, I feel a bit stunned and am not sure what to think.

It's pretty untenable for the band they are the victims here and there will be protests if the gig as advertised goes ahead.

The exposé doesn’t entirely surprise me. I didn’t get the hype for the book and I found the account of losing the house quite unconvincing. I also disliked the random political rants in the middle of the book.

Well, I did the hated thing on MN 😂and ran it past DH (retired journalist/sub editor/editor) who is usually very sceptical about the state of modern legacy journalism. His verdict, "no way would that have got past legal without proof and no way would it have been run without their OK". He's quite impressed.

It makes perfect sense read in the original context, given the 'Overlander' quoted by @Choux has themselves written a work of narrative non-fiction.

Helen Clifton.

My former boss (finance director) did this around 2001. We were paper ledger based but moving to online and yes bank statements were checked. No one suspected and he did it a number of ways.

Cash theft. We took large amounts of cash a couple of times a month (£30k to £60k plus across a number of outlets). No one liked our main boss and he (fin dir) played to this claiming he was so overworked he had to reconcile at home. We often told him he shouldn’t and he might not be insured. In this, was also the fact that staff at two or three outlets couldn’t add up for love nor money (true fact), so whatever they said they took would likely be inaccurate. Again we pushed for training, supervision, performance review which he always rejected. He was head of finance so we didn't question too deeply.

Company credit card. He and our main boss needed to sign off payments. However “for ease”, he’d present the main boss with his own list of transactions to save the boss (who wasn’t good at deep diving into detail) time. These would add up to the same amount as the real transactions and the boss would sign off the actual list without reading it (trusting it tallied with the one he had read). The real one included holidays, home renovations even our staff Christmas presents that we were told he’d bought out of his own pocket.

It equipment - he bought IT equipment that supposedly were site assets (various sites). They were for his home use.

False company. He set up a company with a very similar name to one we used and invoiced a few times for a few thousand which were paid.

Scanned fake invoices from existing suppliers. We had a three in one printer/fax/scanner - very posh then. He scanned the headers and footers of some of our genuine suppliers and marked them as settlements by credit card - payments going to a company account of another company he set up.

He flounced in a temper and we found all this within a couple of weeks of him going (without him there covering up it was pretty obvious when takings shot up).

The month before we had had a full audit and the auditors had picked up nothing.

I looked at the Gangani Publishing website last night, but funnily enough, it’s now disappeared! Also, you’re right, none of the houses in either episode 1 or 2 (both Wales) of season 12 of Escape to the Country matched up with the picture on the website, or the picture of their former home.

So that was all a fib as well!

Likewise. Though I'm a broadcast journalist. This would have been referred ever upwards until everyone was satisfied.

Waaw

But it always comes across as a bit dickish, saying you and 'everyone' in the industry knew.

The rest of us have had enough of that crap where 'everyone' but us mugs forking out the money know.

Deputy heads must roll !

The story always seemed odd - My mum passed the book on to me when it was published, but I never finished it because it didn’t ring true.

I’m interested that it has taken this long to check the details.

Do publishers and film producers not check stories? Who would they have made the deal with? Did the couple both change their names by deed poll?

What do you mean the CTM family? Who are they?

Captain Tom's daughter et al and their massive grift.

It’s astounding how it’s got through all the checks.

I haven’t read the book, but I read the article in the Observer today. I cannot believe that Moth’s condition improving and him still living symptom- less etc has not been picked up before. You don’t have to be an investigative journalist to sense something is off there! My DH has Parkinson’s and yes exercise is really helpful, but I find it offensive and dangerous to pretend he can walk himself well and improve his brain scan results. I hope she gets cancelled too!

I feel sad, I liked the book amd saw the film - I never go to the cinema so it was a special treat ( sad life I lead) after an exam. I thought Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs were good in it.
The story of how they lost the house was never convincing. I find it hard to believe that Moth may not really be ill, surely that would be a fib too far.
Sadly people are not very honest or trustworthy. But it never ceases to be a disappointment.....

Why didn’t anyone do anything about it then? Is it because they needed to make sure they had cast-iron proof of what was happening, and it took them several years? It seems weird it’s all coming out now it’s been made into a film, and the Winns/Walkers have made lots of money!

Ahh yes.

This. Sorry @Fandango52 I shouldn't have been lazy and abbreviating.

What I wouldn't give for the 😆 reaction back!

In the interview I saw Winn told a different story. She said they weren't even offered temporary accommodation because Moth had more than a year to live. Must be hard to keep the story straight.

The article is very careful to say that they have no information about his condition and ‘Miracle’ recoveries do happen - but if they were misleading people it seems similar to those influencers who make misleading/false claims about curing cancer.

In the Apple Cider Vinegar case, the investigative journalists knew they couldn't persuade Belle Gibson to disclose her medical records. So they spent years digging up evidence for fraud
The Observer did the same, as no one can be forced to disclose medical information.