Immersion Journalism

Want to know what it's like living in unique or unusual circumstances? A form of writing called immersion journalism can give you a sense of living that different life. In this book genre, the author puts him or herself into a unique situation and writes about the experience from a personal point of view. Some situations are serious while others are silly. Each of these titles can be considered a form of immersion journalism:

• Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment by A.J. Jacobs
• Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich
• Dishwasher : One Man's Quest to Wash Dishes in All Fifty States by Pete Jordan
• Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin by Norah Vincent
• My Freshman Year: What a Professor Learned by Becoming a Student by Rebekah Nathan
• A Few Seconds of Panic: A 5-Foot-8, 170-Pound, 43-Year-Old Sportswriter Plays in the NFL by Stefan Fatsis
• Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany by Bill Buford