“Soot and Steel: Dark Tales of London” is a collection of short stories set in London, focusing either on dark fantasy/horror or bleak lives in the city. Seven of the tales are reprints dating from between 1851 and 1922, while the rest are original to this anthology. As with any such volume, each reader will prefer some stories to others, but the overall quality of the tales is quite high in this group. My favourite in the whole book, “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle” by Juliet E. McKenna, is the most upbeat of the lot (I won’t give away the delightful ending); I also much enjoyed “Queen Rat” by David Rix, about a mudlark and a sewer rat encountering treasure in the ancient sewers of London, sewers about to be disrupted by the advent of the Tube and better sewage systems; “The Ghost of Cock Lane” by Rose Biggin, in which Dr. Samuel Johnson sorts out a death, a haunting and a threatened hanging; and 1919’s “A Romance of the Piccadilly Tube” by T. G. Jackson, which is both a meditation on the corrupting powers of money and a ghost story. I only disliked one story, but that was because it was set during World War II during the Blitz and I simply do not like WWII stories in particular; the story itself was well-written and engaging, however. I recently reviewed “London Centric: Tales of Future London,” edited by the same Mr. Whates; “Soot and Steel” is the companion volume, published first in 2019. Both volumes together provide a rich reimagining of one of the most vibrant cities on Earth, and both are highly recommended! ( )

This review is for the ebook of Soot and Steel as provided by LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

About half of this collection of short stories centered in London is composed of new material and half is a century or more old. While the locale may be the same, and all involve mystery, the occult, or the fantastic, the style of writing is obviously different. Whether you will find that interesting or jarring will depend on your personal tastes. I am not a great fan of the Victorian style of writing, so I tended to enjoy the new material more. Many of the older stories are what I'd simply refer to as “odd,” atmospheric and gloomy but not with a memorable plot.

My favorites were “Hunger” by Bryony Pearce, a novel twist on the vampire myth in which the central character captures the last breaths of the dying and consumes them to prolong his life; “From the Casebook of Master Wiggins, Esq.” by Paul Di Filippo, a very good Sherlock Holmes pastiche; and “Southall Tantra,” by Paul StJohn Mackintosh, in which headlessness is next to godliness. ( )

I received an e-copy of Soot and Steel as part of the LT Early Bird Reviewers program. One of the great things about anthologies - if you don't like/enjoy one story, there's bound to be a couple good one, and if you're lucky, a gem (or two).
Soot and Steel is that kind of book. Grime, Darkness, Dangerous Byways of London - what's not to like? ( )

"Soot and Steel" is an anthology edited by Ian Whately with sixteen stories selected to expose London's "grim and sooty underbelly." Half of the stories are either about poverty, or poverty provides the pervasive background. In some pieces, such "Watercress Girl" by Henry Mayhew and "Queen Rat" by David Six, squalid circumstances are faced with an indomitable spirit that promises survival, if not success. When London itself is not dark enough, sinister characters, some real and some fantastic, cast their own long shadows.

There is an occasional light touch. "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle" by Juliet E. McKenna evokes familiar children's stories, and Paul Di Filippo provides a Sherlock Holmes pastiche with Wiggins of the Baker Street Irregulars as protagonist, but Di Filippo errs in making Wiggins the narrator as well, since the prose is not that of a street urchin.

Either the realistic tales were better written than the fantasies, or sex and violence are easier to portray than the paranormal. In any case, the grim tales stand up better than the ghostly ones, cases in point being "Christopherson" by George Gissing and "Behind the Shade" by Arthur Morrison.

The collection is worth reading, but most readers will not return to it a second time. ( )