I've just returned from a trip to the Happiest Place On Earth.
Disneyland!
It doesn't matter if it's pouring rain (it was) or if there are a gazillion people there (like the time the park reached capacity by noon- 80,000+ people!), but a visit to Disneyland guarantees a fantabulous day.
The churros are amazing and the rides are super fun. Plus, there's something about being immersed in a make-believe world that makes worries about work, bills, and all that mundane stuff just disappear. Yay!
In college I took a History of Disney course (and received 3 credits for it) where the professor pointed out that when you're in Disneyland you can't see anything else. The freeways and hotels are entirely blocked out.
Walt Disney was a smart guy.
I think you can see where this is going. A book should guarantee the same immersion. Different genres will have different levels of world building, but all novels should let the reader escape into a new world. I used to be wary of boring a reader with minutiae, but now I've discovered those little details make a scene richer. Plus, it gives me an outlet for nifty-neato tidbits I find while researching.
Fun things I managed to pull into my novel: Eating off monkey heads, using crocodile dung for birth control, and shaving off eyebrows to mourn cats.
More on all that coming soon!