I take considerable pleasure as a novelist in creating what I hope are captivating characters with audacious goals, plopping them smack down in the middle of engrossing settings and then placing perilous challenges in their way. That’s the essence of good fiction, isn’t it?

I’m doubly blessed, though, to write stories blending fiction with facts. It’s an opportunity to make stories not only more compelling, but also more believable. To make the impossible seem plausible.

As it turns out, life often imitates this kind of art.

The latest example surfaced in news coverage of a recent auction at which a single dime sold for $1.25 million. One of the protagonists of my mystery series risks her life to recover two dimes manufactured the same year at the same mint. Spoiler alert: Before the novel ends, she auctions off one of the dimes for even more money.

By way of explanation, let me introduce Billie Brownwell. She’s a brilliant and beautiful history professor obsessed with finding a cache of stolen loot buried by the outlaw Butch Cassidy more than a century ago in the rugged northwest corner of Colorado. She’s convinced the cache includes two dimes minted in 1894 in San Francisco — among the rarest and most valuable coins in existence.

There’s a mystery within the mystery involving the manufacture of dimes in San Francisco. Only 24 dimes were minted there in 1894, an infinitesimal number compared the nearly 2.5 million dimes minted a year earlier. Why so few? In part because a depression dubbed the Panic of 1893 slashed demand for coinage. Some numismatic sleuths believe the 24 dimes were minted as presentation pieces. Others believe mint employees struck 24 dimes to round end-of-fiscal-year records to an even amount, never imagining they wouldn’t make more. One way or the other, they realized they had a rarity on their hands.

John Daggett, superintendent of the San Francisco Mint at the time, supposedly gave three of the dimes to his daughter, Hallie, and told her to put them away until she was older, when she could sell them for a good price. She followed her father’s advice and nearly 60 years later sold two of the dimes to a California coin dealer. One of the so-called Daggett specimens subsequently sold again for more than $1 million. Hallie admitted she spent the third dime her father gave her — on a dish of ice cream.

Today, only nine examples of the 1894-S dime are known to exist — most of them held by wealthy collectors for decades at a time.

All that’s factual, as are the accounts of Butch Cassidy and his gang robbing trains in Wyoming. Not to mention Cassidy hiding his loot in northwest Colorado and nailing horseshoes on trees to mark the spots.

But what if? That question constitutes the mother of fiction, doesn’t it?

What if two 1894-S dimes were mailed to Philadelphia — purportedly for assay testing to ensure they met manufacturing standards, but more likely to surreptitiously send valuable coins to the mint superintendent? What if Cassidy stole the express mail shipment in the train robbery and stashed the dimes with the rest of his share, unaware of their value? Most important, what if an ambitious history professor deduced that outcome from her painstaking research of the post-Civil War West?

There’s more to my novel in my other protagonist. Meet Tucker Preston, a newspaper journalist who settles for a job as editor of a small town weekly in northwest Colorado after layoffs at the Denver daily where he worked. He seizes an opportunity to resurrect his career in investigating the disappearances of both an environmental lawyer and elderly cattle rancher. He uncovers a plot involving betrayal, murder and plans to dam a scenic river and sell the water to downstream interests.

Billie and Tucker meet, of course, and join forces. They soon face a series of threats first to their livelihoods, then their lives. In the midst of the desperate search for treasure and truth that ensues, they discover newfound love.

I’ve combined in my novel elements of a treasure hunt, murder mystery and romance. But don’t forget the facts. Like those rare dimes minted in 1894 in San Francisco.

If it turns out you can’t dig up one from a buried cache of outlaw loot, you can always buy one at auction.

It’s easy to maintain an attitude of gratitude with my proverbial cornucopia overflowing with ample food, good health and the love of those I cherish most. I’m doubly fortunate, though, as a retired newspaper journalist turned mystery novelist. I write every day. Flex my creative muscles. Best of all, I continue to pursue my lifelong passion to tell compelling stories.

In this season of thanksgiving, here are a few of the many blessings I count as a novelist:

1. The English language and its more than 170,000 words. That’s a lexicon large and varied enough to supply the right word for every occasion without settling for the almost right word. It’s a distinction Mark Twain compared to the difference between lightning and lightning bug.
2. Writing that conveys in clear and convincing fashion exactly what you want to convey. The vivid description that immerses readers in a scene. Authentic dialogue that not only propels stories forward, but also reveals character. What Ernest Hemingway described as “the truest sentence you know.”
3. The good idea that materializes out of thin air and twists your story in a way you never expected. As a pantser — someone who eschews planning and writes instead by the seat of his pants — I discover how my plot unfolds the same time as my characters. I’m invariably surprised and supremely grateful for something more interesting than anything I could have devised ahead of time.
4. A good editor with a keen eye for details, a deep understanding of what makes stories good and a collaborative approach. I’m blessed beyond measure to work with a skillful and experienced editor who makes my writing better than I ever thought possible. She’s both muse and mentor in providing inspiration and guidance.
5. The camaraderie of writers who’ve been there, done that and understand the persistence required to write fiction. I meet weekly with an eclectic group of writers as talented as they are supportive. They criticize, but always in constructive ways. There’s an implicit admission we all struggle, but also the assurance we struggle together.
6. Beta readers who provide valuable feedback on manuscripts before they’re published. My mystery novels feature an amateur sleuth in a history professor. Imagine how fortunate I am, then, to know a real history professor willing to share his time and expertise to read my pages and tell me what I’m doing right and wrong.
7. Novels that offer proof of what’s possible, set examples to emulate and provide motivation to keep working on my craft. That makes me grateful to Ray Bradbury, C.J. Box and Robert McCammon. That’s not to mention Mark Stevens and Kevin Wolf.
8. Google and other internet resources that make research easy and provide quick answers to strange questions at the push of a few buttons. I’m sure I’m not the only mystery novelist who wonders how fast corpses decompose in cold water or what poisonous mushrooms grow in Colorado.

I’d love to add to my list literary agents who respond promptly to queries. While I’m at it, how about a three-book deal with a big-five publisher that includes a six-figure advance?

For now, though, I’ve got more than enough for which to be thankful and maintain my attitude of gratitude.

Why write?

The answers are as numerous and unique as writers.

My answer for more than 40 years was simple: I like to eat. I wrote for a total of seven newspapers in that span to earn money to buy food. Not to mention pay for housing, beer and other necessities. Don’t get me wrong. I loved my jobs. I was paid to talk with interesting people and tell interesting stories. Thousands of them over the course of my career. But I never could have done so without also paying the bills.

During the past decade, my answer became more complicated. In addition to news stories, I wrote two novels. The first installments in a mystery series set in the rugged northwest corner of Colorado. And now that I’m a recovering journalist — retired, that is — I write mostly fiction. I’m blessed to no longer write as a means of subsistence, but for other reasons.

The fun of it, for starters. Joy springs from choosing exactly the right words, arranging them in elegant sentences and conveying ideas in compelling fashion. Writing fiction is a bit like describing the movies playing in my head and hoping readers see what I see. The more detailed and vivid the descriptions, the more likely they’ll want to follow along.

It’s no less enjoyable to discover where creativity leads. As a pantser — someone who avoids planning and writes instead by the seat of his pants — I get to tag along with the characters in my novels and find out what they do as the plot unfolds. I’m almost always surprised. And grateful, because it’s usually something more interesting than anything I could have devised ahead of time. Believe it or not, the process works that way.

More than anything, I write to bring my characters to life and share their stories. I want readers to join my small town newspaper editor and my history professor on their adventures. To endure their setbacks. To celebrate their victories. To foster a deep personal interest in their well-being.

Author Judy Blume emphasizes this internal compulsion and emotional connection in her advice to writers: “The best books come from someplace deep inside. You don’t write because you want to, but because you have to. Become emotionally involved. If you don’t care about your characters, your readers won’t either.”

But that also induces my recurring fear. If I don’t introduce the characters from my novels to the world, they’ll die when I die, unknown and unappreciated figments of my imagination. I worry they’ll gather around my deathbed and press for an explanation.

Why write? Because I have to.

Bluebird day.

Anyone who’s spent enough time in Colorado knows about that remarkable experience. A sunny day savored beneath a cloudless sky painted with a palette of blues ranging from cyan to cerulean.

Skiers and snowboarders especially prize the bluebird days that follow snowy nights, a deep blue sky above and glittering white landscape below. The contrast is no less vivid on a crisp fall day in the high country, where yellow aspen leaves quake in the breeze and tumble like gold coins from the blue heavens.

Bluebird days occur in Colorado because of a combination of weather and geography. Low-pressure systems that push storms west to east often precede high-pressure systems that bring air so still and dry it takes on a crystalline clarity. Mountain elevations intensify the illumination of the sun. At least that’s the scientific explanation.

I believe there’s a psychological component as well. Bluebird days induce euphoria. An eagerness to accept challenges, push limits and seize opportunities before they’re squandered. To realize successes.

Then there are the metaphorical aspects of bluebird days. And, at long last, my point as a novelist: Bluebird days constitute an important metaphor in mystery writing.

What’s the opposite of a bright and clear day? A dark and stormy night — part of the opening lines made famous by first Edward Bulwer-Lytton and then Madeleine L’Engle. Don’t forget Snoopy, the cartoon strip beagle who typed his novels atop his doghouse.

Most mysteries don’t begin on dark and stormy nights, but dead bodies often appear on opening pages. Corpses — and, by extension, foreboding evil — provide a reliable hook that yanks readers into stories at the onset. Detectives, private investigators and librarians — sleuths of all sorts — then go about the process of figuring out who done it and bring the villains to justice. In that process, sleuths invariably endure life-changing difficulties even as the stakes mount.

What follows every metaphorical dark and stormy night? That supreme ordeal? A metaphorical bluebird day. A resolution. Challenges accepted, limits pushed, opportunities seized and successes realized.

I write what I contend are bluebird day mysteries set in the rugged mountains of Colorado. My mysteries include plenty of dark and stormy nights in deadly shootings, mine cave-ins and other catastrophes. Villains commit heinous crimes motivated by greed, envy and revenge. My sleuths — a relentless small town journalist and brilliant history professor — endure their own difficulties. But in the midst of their desperate searches for truth and treasure, they discover meaning. Good triumphs over evil and love conquers all. Bluebird days prevail.

I hope my bluebird day mysteries offer readers an escape from what’s too often the stresses and tedium of life — bad days at work and mind-numbing scrolling through screens. I offer a chance instead to sit, relax and savor a compelling story told well.

In other words, an experience as enjoyable and satisfying as a bluebird day in Colorado.