Mary Elizabeth Carter was an English writer active during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Born in Masham, North Yorkshire, in August 1852, she was the eldest of five children born to Elizabeth and Thomas Carter, a local silk merchant and magistrate. In her thirties, she married Peter Stevenson, a farmer sixteen years her senior and the brother of the notable toxicologist Thomas Stevenson.
Carter's literary career spanned both fiction and non-fiction. Between 1883 and 1893, she authored several romance novels published by the prominent London firm Richard Bentley and Son. At the turn of the century, her writing took a distinct turn toward social commentary and domestic advice. In 1903 and 1904, she published two non-fiction books through New York publishers focusing on household management. These works were notable for addressing the systemic inequities and challenges faced by domestic workers employed in wealthy households.
Throughout her life, Carter maintained significant literary connections, most notably with the novelist George Gissing and his sister, Ellen. Her extensive correspondence with Gissing was highly regarded, and selections of their letters were eventually published in T.P. Weekly in 1912. Carter spent her later years in Dorset, where she died in the town of Beaminster on June 6, 1928.
