![\"Raynor](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/\/d13160f3-2d5b-4ca8-b5b2-503a54cc233f.jpg\")
<\/p>\nThe owner of a Cornish beach caf\u00e9 has described being left feeling \u201csick\u201d reading the depiction of the business in The Salt Path. <\/p>\n
Joanna Cocking, 51, said she was shocked when she read that the person running the small caf\u00e9, her mother, was depicted as a bully.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I got sent the bit of the book that we were in, I just felt sick. I just wanted to write to the publisher and say: \u2018You can\u2019t write this.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n
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Raynor Winn\u2019s The Salt Path was presented as a true story but has come under intense scrutiny<\/p>\n
ADRIAN SHERRATT FOR THE TIMES<\/p>\n
She said that she was sure there must be some mistake, especially as the caf\u00e9 in Porthmellin wasn\u2019t mentioned by name, but there is only one such establishment in Mullion Cove.<\/p>\n
The bestselling memoir by Raynor Winn, which was recently adapted into a film, was presented as a true story by its author, but has come under huge scrutiny<\/a> after claims that significant details were omitted or exaggerated.<\/p>\n In the book Winn described how, having lost their home, she and her husband Timothy \u2014 known as Moth \u2014 walked the 630-mile (1,014km) South West Coast Path, camping along the way.<\/p>\n On the journey they stopped at Cocking\u2019s caf\u00e9 on the Lizard peninsula, which at the time was run by her mother. <\/p>\n \u201cA man in his twenties waited tables, cleared tables, politely dealt with grumpy customers, cut cakes, swept the floor,\u201d Winn wrote, before describing the arrival of the angry owner. \u201cWhat the f*** do you think you\u2019re doing? There\u2019s two tables out there uncleared. What do I pay you for? You\u2019re f***ing lazy.\u201d<\/p>\n According to the book, the waiter gives the couple a free panini each before announcing that he was quitting. In Winn\u2019s account, the young man then locked up and dropped the key through the letterbox.<\/p>\n Gillian Anderson as Winn and Jacob Isaacs as Moth in the film of The Salt Path and, below, Mullion Cove<\/p>\n ALAMY<\/p>\n Cocking told The Observer: \u201cWhen I read that, I was thinking: \u2018That can\u2019t be us.\u2019 I was absolutely mortified. She never named the caf\u00e9 but she might as well have because there is only one caf\u00e9 in this cove.\u201d<\/p>\n According to Cocking, the fact that there is a caf\u00e9 in Mullion Cove is the only thing in Winn\u2019s description that is accurate. She said: \u201cNo one could sweep the floor [in the caf\u00e9] because it\u2019s been carpeted for years. My mum, who owned it, was a typical old Cornish woman and she never swore or spoke like that. She was there all day and no way would mum let a youngster lock up.\u201d<\/p>\n Cocking said there had been few male waiting staff over the years and nobody had walked out. There was no letterbox in the door and the caf\u00e9 has never served paninis. \u201cI don\u2019t think she ever came to our caf\u00e9, I really don\u2019t,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n The publisher, Penguin Michael Joseph, has described Winn\u2019s book as \u201cunflinchingly honest\u201d but large parts of the tale have been called into question after serious distortions emerged. The author painted herself as a victim yet has now admitted she \u201cmade mistakes\u201d after being accused of stealing from her employer.<\/p>\n![\"Gillian](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/\/9b237777-71f2-4c4f-9eb7-3dbdaf521aa7.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Mullion](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/\/da078c5f-8127-4d91-badc-70506e72850f.jpg\")
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