Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Thread 8: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

1000 replies

DisappointedReader · 16/07/2025 23:41

Well, this has turned out to be slightly longer than the dozen or so replies I expected when I started the first thread!

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

2nd Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-whats-in-the-book-and-what-the-observer-has-found

3rd Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-the-truth-behind-the-blockbuster-book-video

4th Observer
‘I felt I was being gaslit’ – the landlord who helped Ray...

Thread One ^www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5368194-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?^

Thread 2 Thread 2. To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet

Thread 3 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5369425-thread-3-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 4 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5370609-thread-4-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 5 Thread 5: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet

Thread 6
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5372494-thread-6-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-
husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 7
www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5373425-thread-7-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

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 extremely cautious when it comes to naming or implicating people and addresses not in the public eye or with no direct 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.

We have done amazingly well together - in the main that is, not mentioning any names but you know who you are! - for seven threads so far. I can't be on the threads as much as I'd like so all help with keeping our discussion ticking along in a healthy and civil fashion is very welcome.

No saltiness. Keep to the path. Thank you.

OP posts:
Thread gallery
38
OpenThatWindow · 17/07/2025 22:09

I'm off to steal some KitKats.

It's okay because someone somewhere is doing much worse.

😇

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:11

Aspanielstolemysanity · 17/07/2025 22:08

Are you calling north of £60,000 "petty theft"? Because the bulk of the theft has been about that and other lies.
The brags about stealing chocolate bars etc just provide colour to the picture that is building

No, I was responding to a question about petty theft.

The larger theft is unproven. Innocent until proven guilty and all that…..

AldoGordo · 17/07/2025 22:11

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Aspanielstolemysanity · 17/07/2025 22:12

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:08

So you can trust a dodgy person (in this case a journalist) then?! She learnt from her mistake so must now be undodgy!!

It's irrelevant whether we can trust her. The facts speak for themselves.
Raynor hasn't said she didn't steal. If she didn't steal she would have said "I didn't steal". Instead we got some waffle about it being a busy time and mistakes being made. That's like when I asked my 5 year old daughter if she had cut her own fringe (she had appeared in the kitchen with a savage mullett) and she said "it fell off".

Smike · 17/07/2025 22:14

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 20:42

Thanks for the warning @sualipa

happy to challenge the BS cloaked in moral high ground on this thread. For example, the characterisation of the wife who did not sign the NDA but who knew that it existed and what it was signed for (ie non disclosure) who felt it ok to reveal all as victim.

I’m just asking folks on here to get a grip and think about the impact of what they’re doing/saying. Does this author - who has given so much pleasure to so many - deserve to have her entrails ripped out by a group of hungry hyenas? I say no.

I’m not a plant. I just disagree with many of you that Winn is evil personified.

I’m certainly not suggesting Sally Walker/Raynor Winn is ‘evil personified’. I imagine, on the basis of having read her three books, various interviews and features, the Observer piece and her rebuttal, and the interventions by people like Bill Cole, that she tweaked timelines, lied by omission and created a narrative of blameless victimhood, courage and redemption that she didn’t expect to get so big, or for her readership to stay so interested in what happened next, Moth’s health, and if you’ve already long since sold the film rights, you can’t get cold feet halfway through shooting. So you’re stuck with the lie.

Aspanielstolemysanity · 17/07/2025 22:15

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:11

No, I was responding to a question about petty theft.

The larger theft is unproven. Innocent until proven guilty and all that…..

But Raynor hasn't protested her innocence. She just said "mistakes we made". And her conduct speaks tells its own story

  • ran away before police interview
-borrowed money at extortionate rate
  • used borrowed money to pay former employer the amount she was alleged to have stolen
  • paid lawyer to prepare an NDA.

It's odd to try and defend Raynor/Sally on this matter when she isn't even trying to defend herself.

Aspanielstolemysanity · 17/07/2025 22:17

FlyAgaricc · 17/07/2025 22:09

@Aspanielstolemysanity so sorry

Oh don't be sorry, the homeless bit was rotten (don't believe anyone who makes it sound like a mindfulness retreat Wink) but escaping him was the best decision I ever made. And the police were amazing in supporting me and so were my work.

Stravaig · 17/07/2025 22:18

The React options are a wee bit limiting.

🤥🥴😵‍💫🥛😬
😲🤯😆🤣
🧵🤗
😇

Nameychangington · 17/07/2025 22:23

The Observer is under new ownership. Do we know what value-system and funding are propping it up?

Ohhh, this is a purity spiral. Well if we're playing that game, what 'value system and funding' is propping Raymoth up? People who live in glass houses shouldn't steal and lie then accuse others of having poor values and funding, IMHO .

FlyAgaricc · 17/07/2025 22:26

Don't bite

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:30

Isn’t that obvious? Because they all have an axe to grind / money to make as a freelance journalist.

Why are you so convinced that Winn is the devil personified? These armchair detective activities might seem enjoyable, but they have devastating impacts.

I’m going to bale out now.

Hace a nice life and be kind.

Ellmau · 17/07/2025 22:32

Why are you so convinced that Winn is the devil personified?

Sorry, but that's ridiculous hyperbole.

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:34

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Thanks for the vote of confidence. I get inspired when I get a sniff of bullying behaviours

hobbledyhoy · 17/07/2025 22:36

<Sally has left the chat>

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 17/07/2025 22:37

FlyAgaricc · 17/07/2025 22:26

Don't bite

Only into one of @OpenThatWindow 's ill gotten KitKats.

AldoGordo · 17/07/2025 22:41

Catwith69lives · 17/07/2025 15:32

A propos my previous post with the photo of the notes in the margin of Paddy Dillon's SWCP guidebook I've noticed something quite interesting:

  • the stretch between Porthcurno (Minack Theatre) and Mousehole is described on pages 176-7
  • an incident is recounted involving them meeting a 70 year old American lade who is looking for the house of John Le Carré, an old friend of hers whom she has visited in the past but she can't remember where his house is located: "I've been looking for the house of my old friend John Le Carré. I stayed with him when I was younger:we'd spend summers here, just writing,swimming. Great days. I come and walk your path every year, I've searched for him again and again,but I can't seem to remember where the house was"
  • she jokes with SW and TW that his name is David not John which is just his pen name (his birth name was David John Moore Cornwell)
  • they leave the old lady floundering around looking fr John Le Carré's house and head off towards Mousehole..
  • In the notes in the SWCP guide, SW writes " met an interesting lady walking the coastal path"
  • in the next cove she circles the location and writes the house of "Mr John" - who would of known it!

Interesting

  • the spot circled is the exact location of John Le Carré's home
John Le Carré's spectacular clifftop home in Cornwall has come on to the market | Country Life
  • the annotation appears to have been made with a different pen
  • this suggests to me that SW made the comments much later AFTER she had completed the walk and done some research into the location of John Le Carré's house. If not, she would surely have mentioned it in the book
  • So was the entire John Le Carré/David anecdote made up? I don't know. Did SW do research about John Le Carré after the walk was completed and annotate the Paddy Dillon guide accordingly? Certainly seems that way.

Even if she marked it after the walk, I don't think this necessarily discredits the veracity of this anecdote. I suggest she may have just been doing research for TSP by following up any points of interest in the guidebook margin. So in this case she could have looked it up and then marked it in the margin, written with a surprised tone, that the women was actually right, that Mr John did once live there.

Bruisername · 17/07/2025 22:41

“Be kind”

or

“shut up and stop pointing out the bad stuff”

I so hate Be Kind

OpenThatWindow · 17/07/2025 22:44

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:30

Isn’t that obvious? Because they all have an axe to grind / money to make as a freelance journalist.

Why are you so convinced that Winn is the devil personified? These armchair detective activities might seem enjoyable, but they have devastating impacts.

I’m going to bale out now.

Hace a nice life and be kind.

Writing snake oil memoirs to make money - might seem like fun but has devastating impacts.

OpenThatWindow · 17/07/2025 22:45

AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta · 17/07/2025 22:37

Only into one of @OpenThatWindow 's ill gotten KitKats.

Edited

😂

Aspanielstolemysanity · 17/07/2025 22:48

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:30

Isn’t that obvious? Because they all have an axe to grind / money to make as a freelance journalist.

Why are you so convinced that Winn is the devil personified? These armchair detective activities might seem enjoyable, but they have devastating impacts.

I’m going to bale out now.

Hace a nice life and be kind.

Can you explain the rules of being kind? So far I think we have established that you aren't a huge fan of bombing Gaza or chucking government ministers out of windows but are probably chill with stealing £60k from a family run business

AldoGordo · 17/07/2025 22:53

Anyone else thinking what I think everyone else is probably thinking?

Ps. I don't recall anyone insinuating Raymoth is the devil incarnate???

Merrymouse · 17/07/2025 22:55

Aspanielstolemysanity · 17/07/2025 22:48

Can you explain the rules of being kind? So far I think we have established that you aren't a huge fan of bombing Gaza or chucking government ministers out of windows but are probably chill with stealing £60k from a family run business

Apparently the rules don’t include Bill Cole or the Hemmings family.

AldoGordo · 17/07/2025 23:04

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:34

Thanks for the vote of confidence. I get inspired when I get a sniff of bullying behaviours

My comment was more that you seem so confident of your opinions and statements, (such as The Salt Path contains no snake oil) without any cogent argument to support them. The only person who could make such an absolute statement with such unswerving conviction is either the author themself or someone so blind to the facts. You're not the victim of bullying here. You invited debate.

PullTheBricksDown · 17/07/2025 23:05

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 21:49

Once again, the Observer article, written by the discredited Chloe Hadjimatheou, is put up an a pedestal and portrayed as fact. We might want to roll back and think through the political economy of journalism. Is it about careful fact finding or getting a quick scoop whatever the cost? Is it about ensuring a story stands up legally or more about making a calculated guess about your victim’s capacity to sue / win a case? The Observer is under new ownership. Do we know what value-system and funding are propping it up?

more “hyperbole” from the “disingenuous”, “flouncy” “plant” 😘

Can either @Humankindness or some other poster link to the post on this thread where the 'discrediting' has been outlined? I've just read pages 4, 5 and 6 to find it but I can't.

Fandango52 · 17/07/2025 23:07

Humankindness · 17/07/2025 22:30

Isn’t that obvious? Because they all have an axe to grind / money to make as a freelance journalist.

Why are you so convinced that Winn is the devil personified? These armchair detective activities might seem enjoyable, but they have devastating impacts.

I’m going to bale out now.

Hace a nice life and be kind.

  1. Chloe Hadjimatheou is not a freelance journalist - she’s an employee of the Observer.
  2. I’m not saying at all that Raynor Winn is the ‘devil personified’ - and I don’t think anyone else on this thread is either. Please read the previous threads before making this sort of comments. Also, you could say Raynor Winn and her husband have had a proven devastating impact’ on people - such as with the £64,000 she stole from her boss Martin Hemmings.
  3. Please don’t patronise us with ‘have a nice life and be kind’ when you are doing anything but with your comments. You are just coming into the thread, dropping a bomb with your sanctimonious attitude and expecting everyone on here to behave as you what us to. We have been civilised, courteous and very polite, I think.
Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.

This thread is not accepting new messages.
Swipe left for the next trending thread