Talent aside, a huge number of random factors are in your favor if you are published.
The title may sound like a downer. But it doesn't need to be. Frankly, a lot of talented people get published, but in my observation and experience, a lot of not so very talented people get published as well. Talent doesn't guarantee a person success in the least. So how do some mediocre writers get published over some very talented writers? Humans try to find patterns and order out of chaos. We try to find reasons for why things happen the way they do, when there really is no reason to be found, only invented. I'm currently reading a rather fabulous book about randomness called The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow. My current random read. In it, the author illustrates some enthralling examples of how randomness plays out in different industries, and how people try to intepret meaning where there is none. Eventually this causes them to lose out in the end. Mlodinow applies the idea of randomness to the publishing industry as wel...