What to learn from The Salt Path scandal

If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is

The more time I spend online the more I feel trapped in some sort of reality show that could be called Grifter Final Boss.

The never ending supply of people, creators, influencers and public figures who shamelessly sell a fairytale, a quick fix, a simple solution to a really quite complex issue. They’re a plague.

And while we’re all busy dealing with *gesticulates wildly* all that is 2025, it’s easy to be sucked in. To believe. To hope.

Indeed there’s something deep in our psyche that draws us towards the neatness of a happy ever after ending and a tale of redemption. Think Rocky, Crime and Punishment and, of course, the greatest to ever do it, The Shawshank Redemption. The clue is in the title.

The only thing better than a redemption arc is an exposé, and if you’re a fan of both then you’ll be as obsessed as I am with The Salt Path saga.

For those unfamiliar with this extremely juicy story that’s rocked the British publishing world, I’m going to break it down into three parts…

I.

Since 2018 more than two million copies of Raynor Winn’s memoir, The Salt Path, have been sold. The despair-to-triumph story charts Winn and her husband Moth’s decision to walk 630 miles after a bad investment made them homeless and Moth was hit with a terminal diagnosis of a rare degenerative brain condition.

The Salt Path and its walking-to-wellness plot was so successful Winn published two sequels with similar storylines, and the original book was turned into a film starring Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs.

II.

On Sunday, just five weeks after the movie hit cinemas, The Observer published a bombshell report claiming that central themes of the memoir bore little resemblance to reality…

The Observer claims that:

• Rather than lose their rural home in Wales because of a failed investment, the Winns had their home repossessed after the couple couldn’t repay a loan taken out to pay back money the author allegedly took from her former employer.

• The Winns owned land in France during the time they were homeless in the UK and were wild camping on the coast

• Moth’s neurological condition, corticobasal degeneration or CBD, typically means that sufferers have just six to eight years life expectancy from diagnosis. In Moth’s case he’s lived with it for 12 years.

• While Winn says that long walks with camping gear strapped to their backs helped to ease, and in one account reverse, Moth’s CBD symptoms, doctors who spoke to the paper cast doubt over the claims

• Raynor and Moth are not their real names. Those who knew them before their walking journey, and subsequent literary success, said they went by their government names, Sally and Tim Walker.

III.

On Wednesday Winn hit back, publishing a 2,314-word rebuttal claiming The Observer report was “highly misleading”. She also published three letters from doctors which appear to show confirmation of Moth’s diagnosis.

While she admits that she made "mistakes" when in the job where the money went missing, she stands by her memoir.

Whatever the truth, and I’m sure the inevitable legal action will shed some light, there was already a lesson to learn from The Salt Path. Before The Observer revelations one of the most common complaints about the best-selling book was that its triumph over tragedy plot was painfully formulaic.

The lack of “grey” is what put off author Sophie Heawood. In her insightful post for her Substack,

The Sophist

, she told her readers to “be very very wary of such a clear redemptive arc” and to be cautious of memorists “giving you exactly what you want”.

Heawood’s piece focuses on the complexities of memoir writing but her red flags apply well beyond the genre. In fact her warning can be applied to all manner of scammers. And that’s because, whether by coincidence or not, Winn followed the grifters playbook to a tee. She built a black and white world, played on readers hopes and fears and provided a happy ever after.

It’s a testament to Winn’s ability to build a world readers could get lost in that she manages to convince them that the healing powers of nature and a strenuous hike are all that’s apparently needed to revitalise her dying husband.

We see the same modus operandi play out online everyday. In the wellness space we’re constantly being told that if we release that one unpronounceable muscle all will be ok. Self-help gurus promise us that the right mindset can unlock unimaginable success. Hard-bodied Pilates girlies insist that doing just 12 moves will make us look like them in just six weeks. And don’t get me started on the political swindlers who craft alternate realities. Or Andrew Tate, and hate mongers like him, who thrive because they swear the world is really quite simple if you see it their way.

The common thread between these “creators” is their willingness to dumb down everything to the point of distortion. The easy fix may be alluring but it should also set off alarm bells.

In the face of such a scamming scourge it’s worth remembering that life is messy, everything should be questioned, your smell test should be regularly exercised and anything that purports to be black and white likely is not that straight forward at all. And as Heawood recommends, embrace the grey. It’s where all the interesting stuff is anyway.

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highly flammable is produced and written by me, Rachel Richardson

I’m a content creator, commentator and a consultant for hire at Beginning, Middle and End

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