Party Scenes

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JacobS.Tucker

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Hey everyone,
I had a pretty quick question regarding parties. I'm writing a book where there are a couple parties - HUGE parties. And I have a bunch of different characters in each party that I focus on (I think in one I have at least 13 characters at this party).

How do you guys do this seamlessly? I feel like I'm doing okay at writing it this way, but I'd really like to know how others do and do it better than I do haha.

Any suggestions??

Thank you,
Jacob S. Tucker
 

Whitley

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You may need to describe what you're actually trying to accomplish in the party scene to get better responses to your question because 13 characters in one scene is a lot. Are these characters all active participants in the scene, or just bodies filling out the party? If they're just bodies, they don't need to be named. If they're all going to be active, 13 seems like an overkill.
 

Brightdreamer

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I may be reading this wrong, but I have to agree with the previous poster: tracking 13 people through one big party scene sounds like a very difficult task, and at first blush it really does seem like overkill. Do all of these people need to be at this party... or, rather, do they all need to be included in the narrative, or can it just be mentioned that they were there? In other words, do they all do something or say something necessary to your story at this party, and is there no way to separate these scenes or people out?

My suggestion would be to focus on smaller scenes within the greater chaos, grouping some of these characters together. At big parties, it's natural for conversation groups to form, split, and reform as the event wears on. Let the huge party serve as a backdrop - don't even try to include it all, because it probably won't fit.

JMHO...
 

MsGneiss

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I think it depends on what the purpose of the party scene is. Once you figure that out, you can decide what approach and perspective to take with your party scene. You can always go and check out some famous party scenes in literature. Mrs. Dalloway, Less Than Zero, Madame Bovary, and of course Gatsby. You can also look to Shakeseare's Much Ado About Nothing if you want to stage a masquerade! Or maybe you are trying to stage something like Joffrey's wedding, where you are describing the same event from the perspective of many different individuals.
 
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NeuroFizz

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If the party is written through the eyes of the POV character, the number of people at the party is not so much of an issue. Just keep the reader in that character's head as he/she navigates the crowded party.
 

Jamesaritchie

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I might have thirteen characters at a party, but I'd never try to track more than a couple.
 

dondomat

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Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby; Stephen King's Roadworks; Peter Straub's A Dark Matter, all have big parties described, from low-key small town affairs to thumping blurred youth things... In each case the structure is like this:
I might have thirteen characters at a party, but I'd never try to track more than a couple.
...for an example of an author presenting a massive aristocratic get-together and actually tracking everyone and their aunt, one can read the opening chapters of War and Peace, although it would be be even better to read all of it, as it is a basic education, but be warned--trying to structure POV like Tolstoy without being able to write like Tolstoy enrages readers, editors, and other writers, and they will tear you from limb to limb. So if in doubt of own titanic genius--scale back and go Anglosax on the structure.
 
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Jamesaritchie

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Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby; Stephen King's Roadworks; Peter Straub's A Dark Matter, all have big parties described, from low-key small town affairs to thumping blurred youth things... In each case the structure is like this:

...for an example of an author presenting a massive aristocratic get-together and actually tracking everyone and their aunt, one can read the opening chapters of War and Peace, although it would be be even better to read all of it, as it is a basic education, but be warned--trying to structure POV like Tolstoy without being able to write like Tolstoy enrages readers, editors, and other writers, and they will tear you from limb to limb. So if in doubt of own titanic genius--scale back and go Anglosax on the structure.

I have read it. Twice, actually. Tolstory is what I wa sthinking when I said I wouldn't try to do it. The major complaint I hear about Tolstoy is that he used far too many characters in the same scenes, and readers simply can't keep track of them all, even if Tolstoy could.

There's no doubt that Tolstoy was a great writer, but this is one area where I think he bloated the story in places without good cause.

Describing a party, as Stephen King does, or as, I think, Straub does even better, isn't, to me, the same thing as as Tolstoy did, which is what I think of when actually tracking every character at the party.
 

dondomat

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The major complaint I hear about Tolstoy is that he used far too many characters in the same scenes, and readers simply can't keep track of them all, even if Tolstoy could.

The core of the original 1860's Russian audience was landed gentry and various leisure class people, to whom it was far easier to tell their household staff to handle everything and submerge completely into the book and be able to follow every character, and most likely even recognize modified versions of people they know and cackle at retold anecdotes from the year before.
Today, of course, it's a different matter, with the majority of the reading public having to earn an honest living, and therefore reading in a dip-in-and-out method, which makes it difficult to handle sprawling POV mosaics, and the average Literate Liz can only perhaps have a chance to fully appreciate a Tolstoy type of novel during a week-long holiday with absolutely no responsibilities.
The natural markets of time to read and money to spend--YA--don't really care about the stuff in War and Peace and are also out. At most they can be reeled into similar complexity by lots of tits and sword ala G.R.R.Martin

*EDIT*
Good lord, did I just reason out that War and Peace is a beach read? Must've taken a wrong corner somewhere on the way...
 
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quicklime

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echoing everyone else, if you have thirteen people and feel the need to track them ALL you probably need to kill that desire, and possibly trim some characters as a whole and unneeded character arcs. There ARE books with huge ensembles, certainly, but if you take a book like The Stand, for example, then:

A) that's a fairly uncommon book and undertaking....ensemble books are hard. and even king was accused of bloat by many

B) regardless of A if you opt to do this, then the town meetings in Boulder, or the crowd scenes in Vegas, still had one or two people's POV, not the entire group's. Because even King, who arguably DOES tend towards bloat at times, knew better than to have seven chapters about the meeting in boulder just so e could get Stu, Nick, Abigail, etc.'s take, all of them on the same exact bit of scenery....
 

job

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What everybody said about a writer's ability to follow many characters in a narrative and limiting the scene to what the POV character experiences.

But at the base --
Why are you writing this scene?
What does it accomplish?
What action does the protagonist take that changes the outcome of the story?
What decision does the protagonist make here?
Why have you chosen to put the action or decision in this location?

In the movie Pride and Prejudice (the Keira Knightley version) there's a party scene. There are a dozen named and speaking characters. My advice would be to watch that party scene a dozen times. Take notes of each character interaction. Label them (1) (2) (3) (4).
Remember to add the non-speaking/indirect/not face-to-face moments of interaction. (Jane is embarrassed by her relatives.)

-- What important actions happens in the party scene?
-- When do these important actions/decisions happen? (1)? (4)? (7)?
-- Why did Austen put those actions at a party, boom boom boom boom, one after the other, rather than spreading them out through the book?
-- Why are the interactions (1) (2) (3) in the order they are?
-- What shapes the length and type of the interactions?
-- Where are the interactions placed within the architecture of the setting?

Then drop back and read the scene in P&P itself.
(If you're doing Third Limited POV, look at how this has to differ from Austen's O.N.)
 
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Quentin Nokov

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I have a personal rule that no more than six characters can be in a scene at one time. But I will be having a major party in my novel. A lot of characters will be mentioned, but I always figured the way I'd handle it is span the party over several chapters. So I can track my many characters, but I can space it out. I'm pretty sure the way I have it planned out in my head will be clear and easy to follow. It also helps if you've established all these characters ahead of time. The party doesn't happen until the end of the third book, so the readers have had time to get to know most of the characters I'll be presenting.
 
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