Dreams Turned Into Stories
Phyl Campbell shares her journey from young dreamer to versatile writer, exploring how dreams, real-life experiences, and small-town roots shape her honest, humorous, and genre-defying storytelling.
P hyl Campbell is not easily confined to a single shelf, and that is precisely her strength. Writing across fiction and non-fiction with equal ease, she brings together humour, honesty, and a distinctly unfiltered voice that reflects both her imagination and her lived experience. Her work moves fluidly between the whimsical and the weighty, often blurring the line between the two in ways that feel both surprising and deeply familiar.
Rooted in small-town sensibilities yet unafraid to wander into the strange and surreal, Campbell’s storytelling is shaped by vivid dreams, sharp observation, and a lifelong engagement with words. Whether exploring community dynamics, personal growth, or the quiet absurdities of everyday life, she writes with a candour that invites readers to laugh, reflect, and occasionally wince in recognition.
In this engaging conversation, Campbell speaks openly about her creative journey, the influence of real-life experiences on her work, and her refreshingly pragmatic approach to writing across genres.
What inspired you to start writing at such a young age, and how has that early experience shaped your career?
I have always dreamed vividly and always told stories. My first book, Weird Pie, was originally created when everyone in my school district [and throughout the state] wrote books. We continued to write books each year during Young Author’s conference time, and I submitted poems to newspapers, contests, and kid publications. But my work was never chosen, and I got discouraged. In HS, I won awards for journalism, so I followed that path through college. The downside was writing very concisely to fit column spacing. To this day, my writing is dialogue and action heavy and I have a tendency to skimp on details.
How do you approach writing both fiction and non-fiction, and do you prefer one over the other?
Fiction and poetry come from dreams. My grammar book, my self-help books, and my health journals come from lessons I’ve taught, biting my tongue, or both. I’m more forgiving of my nonfiction, because I’m writing about experiences the same way I teach. Hopefully my words are entertaining to those hearing concepts for the first time that I have been talking about for years. On the other hand (or back to the first hand), trying to write enough detail of my dream without forgetting anything important drives me bonkers.
How do real-life experiences or people influence the characters and events in your books?
When you start looking for patterns, you find them everywhere. My dreams have wild fantasy elements, but I think that’s just my brain’s way of entertaining me so I’ll pay attention. When I wake from them and start to analyze, I find strings to reality that I should pay attention to or that I’ve been looking for ways to share with others. What needs to be shared becomes stories. Collections of stories become books. Sometimes that involves streamlining some stories that weren’t originally connected. As one of my characters says in the first book I published, “All my stories are real, and some of them actually happened.”
In #25 Reasons Why Charlie Should Never Read Jane’s Books to Jane, how did you balance humour with relatable relationship dynamics?
I think when you aren’t in the middle of the argument, it’s easier to find the humor in it. And whether humor is balanced with the relationship dynamics depends on who you’re asking and whether or not they’ve been able to find their own humor in similar experiences.
Many of your stories focus on small towns and community secrets—what draws you to these settings?
I grew up in small towns for most of my life. They say write what you know, and feeling like an outsider is something I know very well.
How do you develop themes of perseverance and personal growth in middle-grade fiction like Martha’s Chickens and the Pirates?
I didn’t think of it as perseverance or personal growth. The only characters who persevere are the chickens. And they don’t exactly get ahead for their scheming and trouble!
Martha and the pirate captain both go FAR outside their comfort zones because their community at home was lacking, so they found new community. I didn’t see that as persevering. I saw it as running away.
However, Martha, the captain, and the pirates DO adapt and change while respecting their non-negotiable boundaries. I see that now.
While living out of state, I had been dreaming that I would be away when my grandmother — Martha, the biggest supporter of my writing — passed away. The dream upset me. I moved back before she died, and my child got to meet her and bond with her. After she died and I released Martha, I realized I was a different person. I didn’t see that personal growth while writing.
What challenges do you face when writing about real-life situations while keeping your stories entertaining?
I’m not afraid of strong emotions, so that part is fine. I like making people cry or be angry as much as I like making them laugh. But in my eagerness to capture the dialogue from my dream or experience, I struggle to fit sensory details in. I realize that people can’t see things as I see them, but fail to appreciate that many readers won’t fill in their own details and still understand scenes as I want them to. I also don’t like transitions. #25 Reasons is a series of stand-alone vignettes so I could justify skipping transitions I didn’t want to write.
How has helping young authors get published influenced your own writing and perspective on storytelling?
I learned to embrace imperfection. Telling stories I wanted became more acceptable to me than creating 50K+ word novels. That acceptance allowed me to release material I’d deemed not good enough based on word count alone.
How would you recommend other authors maintain originality and authenticity when drawing inspiration from personal experiences?
Write about personal experiences as soon as they happen, or when they are solidly on your mind. If you want to hide the identities of those you write about, change their gender. However, this change can make you reevaluate entire situations, because stereotypical men and women interact so differently.
What advice would you give to aspiring authors about building a sustainable writing practice?
Let anything inspire you.
What writing tips would you give to aspiring authors who want to experiment with multiple genres and styles?
Write what you know or what makes sense to you. Build the world with enough detail that others can see it, too. Write more, not less. People can skim, but it’s hard to gain information or trim the fat for what was never written. And as long as YOU want to read what you wrote, others will, too.
