Eli Colter

Eli Colter (September 30, 1890 – May 30, 1984) was the pen name of May Eliza Frost, an American short story writer who published over three hundred stories in magazines from 1918 to 1952.

She was born on September 30, 1890 in Portland, Oregon. She sold her first short story in 1918 but considered the beginning of her career a story published in Black Mask in 1922.

Most of her stories were Westerns, in a style that has been described as "hard-boiled". She published in both western themed pulp magazines like Lariat Story and Western Story as well as general interest publications like Liberty and the Saturday Evening Post. She also published seven Western novels.

She published her last story in 1952. Bad Man's Trail. New York: Alfred H. King, 1931. Rehearsal for the Funeral. Arcadia, 1953. The Last Horror and Other Stories. Sarnath, 2025.

Short stories (horror)

“Farthingale’s Poppy.” Weird Tales 6, No. 1 (July 1925): 37–46. “The Deadly Amanita.” Weird Tales 6, No. 6 (December 1925): 781–92. “On the Dead Man’s Chest.” Weird Tales 7, No. 1 (January 1926): 21–28, 128–34; 7, No. 2 (February 1926): 232–44; 7, No. 3 (March 1926): 379–90; 7, No. 4 (April 1926): 553–65. “The Corpus Delicti.” Weird Tales 8, No. 4 (October 1926): 495–502. “The Last Horror.” Weird Tales 9, No. 1 (January 1927): 29–46, 143–44. “The Greatest Gift.” Weird Tales 9, No. 3 (March 1927): 361–68. “The Dark Chrysalis.” Weird Tales 9, No. 6 (June 1927): 747–66, 860; 10, No. 1 (July 1927): 113–25; 10, No. 2 (August 1927): 242–50. “The Golden Whistle.” Weird Tales 11, No. 1 (January 1928): 85–104. “The Curse of a Song.” Weird Tales 11, No. 3 (March 1928): 367–85. “The Man in the Green Coat.” Weird Tales 12, No. 2 (August 1928): 215–31. “The Vengeance of the Dead.” Weird Tales 13, No. 2 (February 1929): 193–212; 13, No. 3 (March 1929): 383–96. “The Man Who Died Twice.” Weird Tales 34, No. 5 (November 1939): 9–17. “The Crawling Corpse.” Strange Stories 2, No. 3 (December 1939): 13–29. “One Man’s Hell.” Strange Stories 3, No. 2 (April 1940): 13–27. “Design for Doom.” Strange Stories 4, No. 1 (August 1940): 81–90. “The Band of Death.” Strange Stories 5, No. 1 (February 1941): 14–32.