When the author Jim Perrin initially wrote publicly of his relationship with our sister Jac our first knowledge of it was the article ‘Touching the Void’, (a title he plagiarised from Joe Simpson) which was published in the ‘Observer’ in July 2005. Roger Alton was at that time the editor.

We knew that what Jim Perrin had written of our sister was untruthful. She was not his lover, wife and friend, and it was pure sophistry to write so, and to deliberately give that impression. Much else was written which we knew to be misleadingly inaccurate, fanciful, and in parts, complete lies.

In his description of the day on which our sister died he could not recall the colour of the balloon given to her by her daughter which she had tied to the hospital bed-head for the seven days of Jac’s stay; and in the garden that evening the little lilac helium balloon that had floated above her bed was released. The balloon was yellow, with a ‘smiley’ face painted on by Jac’s daughter. Continue reading →