I've read only parts of the books, but I get the impression I only get part of the story. It describes his unpleasantness, but at the same time it describes how lots of people were enchanted by him. The book doesn't explain how that is possible. So I take it with a huge grain of salt.
The 'hero/asshole roller coaster' is a widely accepted description of what it could be like working for Jobs.
On the other hand, there are plenty of people who worked for him for decades, and people who worked for him, left, and then returned.
I suspect part of it was learning how to deal with Jobs and his tantrums, part of it was being talented enough to spend more time as a 'hero' than an 'asshole', part of it was feeling that Jobs was trying to achieve something significant and thus the expected effort was worthwhile, and part of it was finding ways to stay out of Jobs' sight when necessary.
