What does the overuse of direct quotations often reflect in your work

 Some writers' recommendation is to use direct quotations as little as possible, unless the source is so peculiar that it's really important to insert the original language. But it's best to use direct quotations sparingly, otherwise it might reflect a lack of originality in your work, by the use  of only the direct words of another writer or speaker.

citizens are given 25 years of life to prove their worth to society; if they fail to do great things

quite an interesting way to teach topic sentences, because the answer to this question is the best definition of a topic sentence that one can present, it is as if answering the questions taught you how to do it, this is some real teaching, it is terribly well-done.

the topic sentence in this paragraph is:

topic sentences writers stay on track and keep a paragraph from becoming an aimless collection of sentences about an idea.

which incidentally tells you what a topic sentence should be.