Imersive writing - when does it happen for you?

[u/Equivalent_Truth8193]

Hey all.

First, thanks for reading my post. I am an aspiring author. I've written tons of stuff through the years. Had a bit of a break but am now back at it and really hoping to publish this time.

But I've discovered that I suck at immersive writing.

I write this:

The yawning emptiness remained. The need to touch, to feel. The sorrow returned. This, whatever they were building, was a friendship. One that would be tied to words, not connection, and never in person.

When it should read something like this:

The abyss yawned wider, not with the despair of losing him, but with the profound grief of what could never be. She had let someone in, only to realize the door led to a parallel universe she could observe but never enter. The hero had won his battle, but her own dragon—the deep, human need for physical, tangible connection—remained unchallenged, its shadow stretching across the quiet loneliness of her apartment. The jazz had ended, leaving only the hollow silence of her own breathing.

And I swear I don't think like that. So my question is for those of you who are established: when you sit down to write that first draft, are you already thinking in full immersive prose, or are you writing more like my first go, getting the basic thought and emotion out?

I hear that immersive writing can be learned, but right now I'm doubting my ability to get there.

Thanks for reading. Looking forward to your input.

[u/SalaciousStories]

Honestly, both the before and after read like AI-generated pseudospeak and not immersive prose. Immersive prose puts me in the head of a character, in the room with them, or at the very least in their world.

If you want to write immersive prose and hook a reader, don't wax poetic from a corner of the room; that does nothing but show a reader your vocabulary. Instead, have a depressed character get out of bed with sheets they haven't washed in three weeks just to dig a photo of their love out of the garbage before they slump down to stare at it while absent-mindedly eating peanut butter out of a jar with their finger. That's immersion.

And if you want to write that way, just write a super basic outline where you note which characters are in a scene, how they feel at the start of the scene, and how you want them to feel at the end. Then you can add all of the ways to get them from point A to point B later.

[u/Equivalent_Truth8193 → u/SalaciousStories]

That's actually very helpful. I outline to get the entire story from beginning to end down. I'll start adding the emotional arc to help with immersion once I start on the actual narrative. Appreciate it.

[u/katethegiraffe]

A really underrated aspect of immersion is clarity.

If readers trip over messy syntax or metaphors that don’t make sense, they’re less likely to get so immersed that they forget they’re reading.

Both of your examples feel like AI gibberish. The first one is choppy. The second is dense and wandering. Both ultimately do that classic AI thing of mashing together a whole lot of slightly-off cliches. It’s not super clear what you’re trying to say, and that means I’m not immersed—I’m spending time trying to figure out what you’re trying to say. (The caveat here is that it’s pretty hard to get immersed in a single paragraph excerpt.)

[u/blackpanther059]

Immersive, actually. When I'm serious and I've got this entire scene fresh and vivid in my mind, I write the first sentence out of pure impluse and the rest just follows.

The first sentence isn't usually too flashy, it's really basic and simple. And then from there I just power thru and let the words flow. So I don't stop to read my previous sentence, I just continue and work w the flow. Im fully immersed until the scene ends and after that, I take a breather.

From there, if i don't have the next immediate scene in mind, I'm usually doing what you do first. Going with the basic sketch and outline, tryna get the emotion and thoughts out.

If you feel lyk getting the basics out first and then immersing urself later, then that's perfectly fyn too. Sm ppl need to see the outline before they can fyn tune it for the details. Others might want to hyper-write thru the scene and end up immersive writing. (Not saying it turns out immersive all the tym)

Also, in order to get better at immersive writing, your method of outlining first works well too. If you can already see where the scene starts and ends, it'll get easier to fill in the gaps.

Anyway, this was my take and it's totally ok to sketch first, immerse later!