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Canadian-Haitian writer Thelyson Orelien denies claims that his best-selling debut novel was written by AI, as experts and detection tools give conflicting results about reliability.
Canadian-Haitian writer Thelyson Orelien is denying allegations that he used AI tools to write his best-selling debut novel, a controversy that is rocking the French literary world.
The 38-year-old author has said he will prove he wrote the book himself. The novel, about a Haitian migrant traveling to Canada, has been sold to publishers in more than 20 countries. The controversy began when an X account with a handful of followers claimed that the AI-detecting program Pangram had concluded the book was largely written by a text generator such as Claude or ChatGPT. Orelien firmly rejected the claims.
I didn't write this novel with my head, but with my guts and my heart, he told AFP recently. He also told Liberation newspaper that his style was based on Haitian and Caribbean traditions, and that the software was used to the French literary tradition and classical authors. AFP ran excerpts of the book through various AI detection tools and came up with a variety of results.
AI Detection Tools Show Mixed Results
Some tools said it was very likely written by a human, while others claimed it was 100 per cent AI generated. The mixed results highlight the broader uncertainty around AI detection technology. Dozens of tools are now available online, many designed for use in education or publishing. AI detectors generally work by comparing large troves of AI-generated text alongside content written by humans.
Their performance has improved significantly in recent years. In a paper published in October 2025 called Artificial Writing and Automated Detection, researchers at the University of Chicago found Pangram achieving near-zero error rates on medium-to-long extracts. Pangram claims it is able to detect AI text by analyzing and understanding subtle cues in the writing. Thierry Poibeau, a researcher at France's national CNRS research institute and a specialist in natural language processing, said the programs look for linguistic tics.
Linguistic Cues Reveal AI Writing Signs
The classic example is triadic phrasing, using three clauses, or em dashes, Poibeau explained. These telltale signs used to be common in generated texts because the tools had been trained on American scientific writing or American novels. Some words or phrases show up regularly, while monotonous sentence structures are also a warning sign. Many tools publish percentage figures about their accuracy, but the figures are impossible to verify and do not take into account the risk of a false positive.
Pangram CEO and co-founder Max Spero stressed to The Atlantic that the tool should not be the ultimate arbiter, but rather a starting point for a more in-depth investigation. According to Poibeau, these detection systems also run up against a moving target problem because AI programs are constantly evolving. The expert also points to a potential problem when it comes to detecting the use of AI in novels.
The tool may pick up something particular in the writing, something repetitive, but that might be exactly what constitutes a writer's style, he said. Benoit Raphael, an entrepreneur and writer specialized in AI, published his own research using Pangram to test Orelien's work, and the results were also positive for AI. The fact that it rated at around 100 per cent AI, or even 90 per cent, is a pretty telling sign, he told Nouvel Obs magazine.
Critics Question Novel Originality
Although the book was widely praised by critics and was flying off shelves in France before the scandal, some doubts had been raised earlier. Lea Bory on her podcast Torchon was possibly the first to say publicly earlier this month that she thought it had been written by AI because of the repetitive nature of the sentences and the over-use of analogies that are hallmarks of AI.
Writing in newspaper Canard Enchaine, Fabrice Colin also criticized the formulaic sentence structure and said he vainly looked for a unique voice in the prose.
CP24
CTVNews:This story was compiled and edited by the HeadTopics newsroom and HT AI from the reports above.
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