The publisher of The Salt Path may sue its author if she and her husband deliberately lied about the life story that has made them millions of pounds, it was claimed today.
Raynor Winn has been accused of fabricating, or misleading readers, about some parts of her best-selling book including her husband Moth’s battle with a degenerative illness.
The Salt Path prompted two sequels and the film adaptation, which was released in May, where they were played by A-listers Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs.
A source at the publisher has told MailOnline that ‘all options are on the table’ – although the couple insist the book is ‘the true story of our journey’.
Author and broadcaster Richard Osman believes that Penguin Random House, his own publisher, will look to ‘claw back some of the money’ from the couple if they have deliberately lied about their life story.
‘It is a publishing phenomenon. Raynor has got a very, very nice career. You know, she’s made millions.. they’ve got a nice house down in Cornwall’, he said.
But he warned: ‘They would have signed a contract and therefore everything is on them. If something is a deliberate lie, then, Penguin Random House I guess would have some sort of recourse’.
Following an investigation into their backgrounds, The Observer said that The Salt Path’s protagonists, Raynor Winn (right) and her husband, Moth Winn (left), could have misled fans
The Winns with Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs, the stars of the recent film adaptation. It has been claimed that the couple may have made millions from the book and movie
Raynor Winn at home in Cornwall. She has become a huge success since her book’s release, including two more books
In the book, Winn said she and her husband Moth lost a fortune – and their home in Wales – due to a bad investment in a friend’s business.
But Raynor has now been accused of embezzling £64,000 from a former employer and was allegedly arrested. A loan was then allegedly taken out to avoid prosecution and when this was not paid their home was sold, it has been claimed.
Moth Winn has been living with an illness for 18 years with no apparent visible symptoms that medical experts claim would require round-the-clock care within 12 years. It has also emerged that the couple’s real names are Sally and Tim Walker and they apparently owned a property near Bordeaux in France all along.
A spokeswoman for the Winns said allegations made by The Observer newspaper were ‘highly misleading’.
But Richard Osman has said the couple could face financial repercussions if they have lied.
He said ‘a bomb would have gone off’ at the publisher after the Observer’s investigation claimed that husband’s illness and events that led to the couple losing their home were untrue or exaggerated.
Penguin Random House is the publisher of Mr Osman’s Thursday Murder Club series, which is being made into a movie series by director Steven Spielberg.
Speaking on The Rest Is Entertainment podcast with co-host Marina Hyde, he said the publisher could take legal action because Raynor and Moth Winn will have signed contracts confirming their memoirs were truthful.
He said: ‘People are going to be very, very hurt. I suggest there’ll be some legal issues if these things do turn out to be not true.
‘I think that probably you try and claw back some of the money that you’ve passed over. I don’t know this particular contract. The contract would normally be that they have guaranteed that everything, in this piece is truthful’.
Marina Hyde said that Penguin Random House could end up giving the money to build a ‘new neurology wing’ and both predicted that the creditors could be called in again for the Winns.
Richard Osman suggested that the couple may have got around £30,000 up front for The Salt Path before any profits from sales of more than two million copies worldwide.
But the film released this year starring A-listers Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs would have been worth three to four million pound, he said.
Richard added: ‘One assumes, by the way, that the cheques got sent to Tim and Sally Walker, but that’s another thing’.
MailOnline has asked Penguin Random House to comment.
It came as a healthcare charity dropped the author of The Salt Path after claims were made about her husband’s illness and an allegation that she stole £64,000 from a former employer.
PSPA said it was ‘shocked and disappointed’ about the allegations that were reported against Raynor and Moth Winn, which had ‘taken everyone by surprise’.
It was also announced yesterday that Raynor had pulled out of the upcoming Saltlines tour that would have seen her perform readings alongside the Gigspanner Big Band.
Following an investigation into their backgrounds, The Observer said that The Salt Path’s protagonists, Raynor Winn and her husband, Moth, previously went by their less flamboyant legal names, Sally and Tim Walker.
And rather than being forced out of their home in rural Wales when an investment in a childhood friend’s business went awry, as the book suggested, it is alleged that the property was repossessed after Winn stole tens of thousands of pounds from a former employer and was arrested.
When the couple failed to repay a loan taken out with a relative to repay the stolen money – agreed on terms that the police would not be further involved – they lost their home, it is claimed.
A spokeswoman for the Winns on Sunday night told the Mail that the allegations made in the Sunday newspaper were ‘highly misleading’.
Their statement added: ‘The Salt Path lays bare the physical and spiritual journey Moth and I shared, an experience that transformed us completely and altered the course of our lives. This is the true story of our journey.’
When asked to specify which allegations were misleading or factually inaccurate, the spokesman declined to comment further but said that the couple were taking legal advice.
Questions have also been raised about Moth’s debilitating illness, corticobasal degeneration [CBD], a rare neurological condition in the same family as Parkinson’s disease, which is central to the book.
Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs in the film adaptation of The Salt Path, which was released in May this year
The Winns at a gala screening of The Salt Path film in Newquay, Cornwall earlier this year
The life expectancy for sufferers after diagnosis is around six to eight years, according to the NHS – however Moth has been living with the condition for 18 years with no apparent visible symptoms.
As part of The Observer’s investigation, a number of neurologists specialising in CBD were contacted, with one telling the newspaper that his history with the illness ‘does not pass the sniff test’.
It is suggested that anyone suffering from CBD for longer than 12 years would need round-the-clock care.
Released in 2018, The Salt Path details the Winns’ decision to embark on the South West Coast Path when they lose their home after investing a ‘substantial sum’ into a friend’s business which ultimately failed.
In the book, Winn writes: ‘We lost. Lost the case. Lost the house.’
The memoir then describes their subsequent 630-mile walk to salvation, wild camping en route and living on around £40 per week, and is described as a ‘life-affirming true story of coming to terms with grief and the healing power of the natural world.’
It prompted two sequels and the film adaptation, which was released in May, starring The X Files’ Anderson and Isaacs, who recently starred in HBO’s The White Lotus.
The Winns posed for photographs alongside the actors on the red carpet in London at the film’s premiere.
Ros Hemmings said she had been left upset by details in Raynor Winn’s book and the subsequent film adaptation
However following interviews with eight people with knowledge of the situation, it is now claimed that the Winns actually lost their 17th century farmhouse in rural North Wales when Winn stole around £64,000 from the late Martin Hemmings, her former boss at his family-run estate agency, where she worked as a bookkeeper in the early 2000s.
Martin has since died but his wife Ros told The Observer: ‘Her claims that it was all just a business deal that went wrong really upset me.
‘When really she had embezzled the money from my husband. It made me feel sick.’
After initially suspecting she had stolen around £9,000, investigations revealed she had allegedly stolen much more and the police were reportedly called in and Winn was arrested.
The Winns are then said to have visited a distant relative of ‘Moth’ in London who agreed he would lend them the money to repay the stolen funds – as long as the Hemmings agreed not to pursue a criminal case.
‘I just hoped I would never hear from her again,’ Mrs Hemmings said. ‘Until somebody waved that book at me [The Salt Path] and said: ‘Guess who?”
The loaned money is then said to have accrued substantial interest until it eventually exceeded £150,000, it is said.
When the relative’s business then failed, there was a court case and the Winns’ home was repossessed to repay the relative’s business associates.
A further allegation likely to harm the couple’s account of ‘homelessness’ are based on documents which show that, at the time they lost their property in Wales, Sally and Tim Walker owned a house in the south-west of France, which they had purchased in 2007.
Mrs Hemmings told The Observer she was glad her husband didn’t live long enough to see the publication of the book and release of the film.
‘It would have made him so angry,’ she said.
The Winns did not respond to a further request for comment.
