Captivating lines from reading

I'm not a good writer. Through reading and reviewing I hone my writing skills. As I become hip-deep in eating books (3 to 4 books at a time) it dawns on me that critical thinking contributes subtantially to the writing process. Words in mind have to be transcribed on paper, and this is where organization comes in the picture. Essays often read disjointedly because of the random thoughts and ideas that are deprived of the proper transition. So the sentences might be well written and achieve remarkable structural variation but they are like lumps in a bowl of porridge.

I made it a habit to pen marginal notes, a task that has manifested into the colorful post-in thumb-tabbing all my reads the past few years. An important component of these scribbles, besides the usual thoughts and comments to the texts, are favorite lines. Improvement in writing more or less is conducive to imitation. So one of my Moleskine notebooks devotes to the tabulation of captivating lines and phrases. To share a few recent additions:

"...reading serious literature impinges on the embedded circumstances in people's lives in such a way that they have to deal with them."

"...tainted with condescension."

"...came stripped of all but its essential twists and nuances."

"Even being lied to, though hardly was love, was sustained attention."

And this is my favorite one:

"I distrusted book clubs for treating literature like a cruciferous vegetable that could be choked down only with a spoonful of socializing."

Your turn: Figure out where these lines might have originated. They are all taken out of two books.