I think she's betraying that her knowledge of his personal character colors her interpretation and experience of his work:
> Why, then, does his work not give me the ultimate frisson I get when I feel I am in the presence of creative greatness, and which constantly moves me as I read the pages of Leo Tolstoy? I think it is because in Tolstoy I know I am confronting fundamental truths, expressed in fiction that has grown organically out of human life, out of history, and out of the author's heart. In O'Brian, on the contrary, I am reading the work of an artificer, a contriver of genius and, well, a liar.
It’s that last line though. All three sound like uncharitable descriptions of the literal job of a fiction author. And all three have implied or explicit negative connotations.
> Why, then, does his work not give me the ultimate frisson I get when I feel I am in the presence of creative greatness, and which constantly moves me as I read the pages of Leo Tolstoy? I think it is because in Tolstoy I know I am confronting fundamental truths, expressed in fiction that has grown organically out of human life, out of history, and out of the author's heart. In O'Brian, on the contrary, I am reading the work of an artificer, a contriver of genius and, well, a liar.
From https://www.theguardian.com/books/2000/sep/03/biography (link posted elsewhere, though not before I had to resort to using ChatGPT to dredge it up).