In 1877 she published a novel, "The Story of Avis", that was ahead of its time. The work focuses on many of the early feminist issues of her era. In it she portrayed a woman's struggle to balance her married life and associated domestic responsibilities with her passion to become a painter. The protagonist is an independent, extraordinary woman in her time who initially decides her goals will not be constrained by marriage and financial dependence on a husband, although she eventually ends up marrying anyhow. She may have been reflecting her mother's life when she described the impossibility of pursuing both her artistic ambitions and adhering to her domestic responsibilities. Elizabeth's novel was largely influenced by Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Aurora Leigh. Phelps's unfavorable depiction of men's and women's roles in marriage was controversial.