Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-36127905-20180709054203/@comment-36160783-20180712170842

I think part of the problem with the writing comes from an unnecesarry use of description, and much of which makes the story feel sort of melodramatic.

E.g. " As if the constant whine of the lights was some dark parable about his own soul, his own mortality." - This here is an example of it being like, is this REALLY what the protagonist is thinking about some lights in a store? It is, as previously stated, kinda melodramatic.

I also agree with the other comment by BloodySpghetti which is that, not only could Jeremy just find another job if his manager was this cartoonishly abusive, he could likely file a pretty solid lawsuit against her for it.

I thought your grammar was pretty good overall, though in paragraph 12 line 8 you say 'buttong' instead of 'button'.

I think that the character's situation doesn't really come across to readers very well, honestly. As I said before, it seems like Jeremy could just quit working here, or at least deal with his ridiculously abusive boss in a way other then torching himself.

A personal suggestion for how you could change the story to make it work would be if the protagonist were to instead be an undocumented immigrant. Many undocumented immigrants have to deal with abuse at their jobs, because they are often unable to go to the police about their issues, and their managers can manipulate them with threats of contacting I.C.E (or whatever immigration enforcement is relevant to your country).