I'm looking for a way to understand whether a text I'm reading has an immersive experience like in "four dimensions".

I’ve read On Basilisk Station, and I quite appreciated the detailed and moving descriptions of the action, especially the final combat situation where Weber details the fates of crew who happen to be where various extreme ship damage occurs.

But I’m still not quite sure what you mean, in a few ways:

1) I think I get what you mean by “meticulous attention to sensory details, vivid descriptions, and emotional depth”, but I’m not sure how that amounts to “engaging readers as if they’re part of the scene. It seems to me the perspective Weber offers is omniscient with attention to details of cause and effect in arbitrary violence, and shifts to relate the personal experience of various people involved. I wouldn’t think to call that “as if [readers a]re part of the scene” – though it conveys the experience of some of the people in the scene. Is that what you mean?

2) I don’t know what you mean by “in four dimensions”. What four dimensions? In contrast to what? What would be fewer dimensions?

I enjoy the parts of Weber’s writing that focus on the details of how a situation unfolds and why, both technically and impersonally, and then also from various personal experiences and mindsets. It’s often very grim and what happens feels to me more random than forced by the author (even though I expect it’s not as random as I’d prefer). I like that it seems like anyone could die or lose body parts at almost any time, but that it also feels like what happened to get there will be explained and usually make enough sense to satisfy even my very skeptical and demanding criticism.

Another element there is that the characters do tend to receive some attention to their emotional experience and background, as well as their ways of thinking, usually before they get subjected to violence.

Not sure if I understand what your goal is here.

Is is this – Text-To-4D Dynamic Scene Generation
Cornell

I was sick a few months ago and was on a drug cocktail of prednisone and other things. While in bed I was reading a book and felt fully involved in the story. My heart rate would move accordingly. My emotions were a mess.

It was actually a nice experience. Except for being sick. (double pneumonia.)

@Zaku: I just mean that when I read that book, I immerse myself in the characters. At least when they speak or act. Don’t know why. Maybe the 4d was a bit exaggerated. I meant the reader fully immersed in the book. 3d might be more accurate.

@luigirovatti So by 3D and 4D, I take it you mean a measure of how immersed you feel in the story’s situations and characters?

The immersion I felt in On Basilisk Station and some of the later Honorverse books, came from the degree to which I could take the situations as being real(istic) including the unpredictable arbitrariness of outcomes based on how details of situations unfold. The author goes into great detail about how and why things (especially, violent situations) unfold the way they do, including who is aware of what, what they’re thinking and therefore what decisions they make, and what that leads to. That’s how I think about how situations actually unfold.

And, it’s in contrast to the way many stories are designed, where the author wants some things to happen for thematic reasons, and then makes a story turn out how they want, or what they think would make a “good” story. Or at least, it seems that way – I suspect Weber actually also fudges quite a few things to make a story work out a certain way (at least, it feels forced the degree to which Honor survives and seems to usually make much better decisions than most other people, especially in some of the later books), but at least he also goes into great detail about how things play out, such that I can at least partly suspend my disbelief, especially about all the numerous other characters, whom he does spend a lot of attention on, and they definitely can and do make mistakes, and die about as often as seems to make sense, no matter who they are.

However, I also tend to not have as much of a problem with stories whose plots are certainly designed for thematic purposes, IF the story is well-written enough. But my bar tends to be very high for that.