Some of the amazing coincidences that seem to happen in real life would seem like
deus ex machina in a book.
We see stories about people seeing their future spouse in the background of a picture from when they are 5 on a trip to Disneyplace or who go overseas for the first time and run into a friend from school. If these were put in a book, they'd be seen as cheating by the author to get around whatever problem is happening.
Matt Parker (Stand-Up Maths on Youtube) has a good bit about this from a talk at the Royal Institution:
https://youtu.be/6JwEYamjXpA?t=2820
Or, as Mark Twain put it:
Quote:
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Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. ― Mark Twain, Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
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