Stories By Mina Khan: February 2015

Coffee Time Romance has come up with a fun idea that combines two of my favorite things -- books and romance -- in a scavenger hunt that ends up with all kinds of prizes and bookish treats.

The way it works: There are 24 blog posts, each with a link to that author's website or blog. Click on the link and find a special clue. At the the end of the contest period see what message your clues spell out. Enter the message into the Rafflecopter (link provided with the last blog post) and you're entered to win a Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 Nook 7.0. Easy peasy, right?

The blog posts are fun reads -- some will make you laugh out loud, others will make you tear up, but all will warm your heart. (NOTE: The blog posts are on the Coffee Time Romance site and begin with Valentine's Scavenger Hunt! To enter you have to comment on them at the CTR site.)

That's not all. Each of the 24 authors are also giving away individual prizes to people who leave comments on their posts. The more blog posts you comment on, the better your chances of winning an awesome prize!

Prizes include: free ebooks, books, gift cards and more. Here's what I'm giving away:

Want to see what a clue looks like (so it's easier for you spot them on the different sites)? Here's my clue:

Now go have fun at Coffee Time Romance.com! OR you can go straight to my Valentine post to enter for the dragon drawing.

This year I got ambitious and decided to read 100 books for my Goodreads challenge (I usually read about 50 or so) and January ended with 10 books read. Woot! I like that pace, according to the handy little widget I'm 2 books ahead of schedule.

So here are the books I read in January, with my favorite being:

Dust and Light: A Sanctuary Novel

It was an awesome fantasy read. Given the genre, the pace was slower than the romances I usually read, but the world building and premise made up for it.

Here's the premise: an artist can reveal truths through his art and he's given the job of painting portraits of dead people, some of whom are murder victims. Chilling and totally hooked me!

Then Carol Berg pulls me in deeper with a mystery at the heart of the story (why are the children being murdered and who's behind the killings) and the hero's character arc -- He has to learn to see the truth in his own work and himself. He has to let go of what he believed to be true all his life and understand the new truth he's discovered. Strong external story plot and strong internal story growth.

End result: Loved Dust and Light: A Sanctuary Novel and I can't wait to read the next book in the series.

Other January reads:

The Weiser Book of Horror and the Occult: Hidden Magic, Occult Truths, and the Stories That Started It All