Thread 7: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

The Observer The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...

Second article in the Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-whats-in-the-book-and-what-the-observer-has-found

Third item in the Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-the-truth-behind-the-blockbuster-book-video

Fourth item in The Observer
‘I felt I was being gaslit’ – the landlord who helped Ray...

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Thread 6
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Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement Raynor Winn

New posters welcome. It would be helpful to read at least the four Observer items above before posting.

To all - Please be careful when it comes to naming or implicating people and addresses not in the public eye or with no connection to the story, and around the understandable health speculations, especially where details are unclear or still emerging. Please do not engage with possible visitors who seem to have their own agenda and seek to derail.
Keep on the path as we have done together amazingly well for six threads so far. No saltiness. Thank you.

What is the DM link? Or article

It's on the previous page.

I wonder if actually he is the creative one and author of the books but they have chosen to have Raynor as their voice as a female writer works better? There have been a lot of comments that she repeats anecdotes directly from the book, adds nothing extra. Why is that? The few times he has been on screen plus reports from people who have met him he comes across well. Her being the front woman also allows Tim to more easily hide the lack of progression of his illness. @Choux

Yes agree. This was discussedfor a bit on thread 5 or maybe early 6, and I was surprised it didn't take off more as it makes so much sense.

It would explain the point Sally makes about Moth being upset that pp think he made up his illness, when it's actually "Raynor aka the author of the TSP" who pp believe made up his illness. So are they the same person?

From Sally's statement
Among the Observer’s many accusations, the most heart breaking is the suggestion that Moth has made up his illness.

It would also explain some of the odd stories in TSP, including the Simon Armitage running gag and that weird "annointing" scene at the mansion where they had lasagna.

I haven't read the new DM piece but it has already been said that Raymoth had stayed on the land in caravans with Timmoth's parents and were renovating or intending to renovate the French house to all move out there. Life was turning sour in Wales so there was a need to leave and then the deal turned sour between them in France?

The £64k might have been to cover the French purchase, renovations and caravan, renovations and furnishings for the Welsh house and holiday let barn, credit card debts for those renovations and furnishings?

Is the estrangement from family members - apparent from the nephew's LI posts - at least partly as a result of some shenanigans with money, the property purchase and renovations?

I have had a post hidden as it included a link to evidence that Tim’s brother was living in a caravan in France in the summer of 2013 while renovating his property. If they were still close they could have sourced another caravan for Tim and Sally to live either on their own land or the land at the brother’s chateau. I think their relationship had soured by then so that wasn’t an option and the SWCP was the better option (if that’s really what they did)

Yes that stood out to me too! Unless she was so preoccupied by anxiety at the risk of her cover being blown with the high profile screening and media interviews that she didn't really react to much that was going on around her in the present. But she's also socially awkward and or bitter.. and not terribly complimentary about others (except TW/Moth).

It occurred to me that the Pamela Anderson comment in the This Morning interview could be SW minimising GA's importance and status "oh he thought of another actress", or perhaps even trying to imply she's more buxom than GA! It's in keeping with the books to put themselves at the centre rather than give someone else their due (though TW fawns over JI in his charm offensive).

Overall it doesn't seem that SW and GA got on too well, and I expect SW was a bit jealous of her.

SallyRay's defence of Moth's illness was in direct response to The Observer's claims:

They say: In the past Tim Walker has been a public advocate for the charity and it had produced a video of him talking about his condition which was available on their website.

AND: People have the right to keep their medical history private, and Tim has chosen not to provide his to rebut the medical scepticism The Observer put to him.

(my bold).

So it could be a fair assumption to say that the reason she labels it Moth's illness is because she is addressing their allegations in a linear fashion, consistent with her statement. (Tim has chosen not to rebut the scepticism, so she is doing it for him).

The reason this fascinates me is that I'm interested in how people can spin a yarn which hooks people in and that they (the yarn spinners) can come to believe their fabrications themselves. The roots of this date to my family of origin who created a false narrative which just about everyone believed despite much of it being ludicrous. It's horrible to be conned and I think the poster who said that some will double down and defend the scammers because it's embarrassing, is correct. Having one's emotions played with like this is very unpleasant to face as well as the financial scam. Regarding the French property, if the council housing department knew of it, they'd most likely expect the WalkerWinns to sell it and use the money for a deposit in the private sector, such is the dearth of council housing.

Not sure but I see that the brother has now changed his LI description from "author" to "conservator" and removed the link to his blog!

The brother bought the chateau in 2006, so why on earth he would have been interested in buying the pigeon tower in the Village du Dropt in 2007, seems slightly strange. Even if you merge the two properties together, the photos of them don't seem to suggest much of a potential des res.

Maybe there was a falling out for some reason and any plans to redevelop both properties was put on indefinite hold. Guess the younger brother or his son may reveal all at some point.

Not that one about the French property. The link where this poster says the DM
references the family member who made the loan.

The French property intrigues me, the local Marie will know exactly how much tax is due. The French are very good at taxes!

Brits living in a caravan while doing up a French property is very common here (at least pre-Brexit!). Some are actual builders and some are self taught. But you would need to be in reasonable health to do it…

I’m surprised they didn’t sell the property to the builder brother so he could renovate as he had the means and knowledge.

Perhaps by then the builder brother was already focussed on renovating his chateau which he bought in 2006.

Ah, that was from last week I think.

Um, maybe Monday? Or Tuesday?

I think it could have been the first DM article about it.

Even if you merge the two properties together, the photos of them don't seem to suggest much of a potential des res.

I think they've lots of potential, particularly the pigeon tower. It could look really majestic renovated well.

Is there the equivalent of the Land Registry in France at either national or local level?

I'm thinking of a central record of property with dates, names, rights, restrictions, charges (ie mortgages). Which may be searchable on payment of a fee.

Or is property ownership still only evidenced by bundles of dusty deeds in a filing cabinet somewhere.

Love this comment under the article !

Donald Kekong an hour ago

The British middle class are world-class bullshitters. You only need to stroll through your average new-build housing estate to see the quiet theatre at work: names that suggest landed heritage, stories retold over prosecco about how “we lost everything” or “we just needed to reconnect with nature” — when in fact it was a rebrand, not a reckoning.

What we’re watching with The Salt Path is the tip of a much bigger cultural iceberg: middle-class mythmaking. Carefully constructed backstories, redemptive narratives, and spiritual reboots sold as authenticity. The twist isn’t that the story may have been manipulated — it’s that anyone’s surprised.

In this economy, being poor is only palatable if it’s temporary, Instagrammable, and ends in a book deal. So, they walk a few hundred miles and reframe it as pilgrimage. The backstory bends to fit the audience. And like all good estate fiction, it’s just confabulation with a compost toilet.

The saddest part? There was a story worth telling — about rural housing, about real working people sleeping in silos. But that doesn’t sell unless you wrap it in a tragedy-to-triumph arc and squeeze in a healing crystal.

We’re not reading memoirs anymore. We’re buying middle-class folklore. And the publishers? They’re just curating modern myths for people who think Waitrose is a community.

Ooh, that's good. Savage, but good.

I wonder how other nationalities compare on the bullshit-ometer though?

@SpiceRoad I think it's this - https://cadastre.gouv.fr/scpc/changeLangue.do?

Quite a good listen on the latest TSP shenanigans

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/this-much-is-true-crime/id1809279318?i=1000717250791

@crackofdoom I reckon US ranks higher than we do - but we are closing the gap !! US particularly strong on it in relation to business

No was meaning a different DM article- apologies. It was one of the first they did last week that also interviewed the wife of the London relative. Don't have the link to hand but it stated the relative was Tim's uncle while the Observer stated they were a distant relative. I've since worked out the connection which I'll post separately on the thread.

Thanks for these insights @WyldMountainThyme

Ah interesting. I'd assumed CH and The Observer approached PRH at the same time as they approached SW. "To let you know, we asked SW today for an interview regarding..."

Slightly odd for someone who's recently become a millionaire possibly several times over to have a Kickstarter, though?

I don't think he is quite right on this.

I think they got into trouble because being ordinary wasn't palatable.

They had skills - he was a plasterer (and also had the option of working in the family business?) and she was clearly able to get office work. In the 90s and 2000's this should have been enough to put a roof over their heads, and food on the table, but instead they seem to have got in over their heads investing in romantic property dreams.