DNF @ 75 pages or ~20%

I don't think that SA Barnes writes books for me. Between this and Dead Silence, I just don't think she's really writing for the scifi-loving audience, but moreso for the contemporary thriller audience. That said, I think Ghost Station has more of the same that Dead Silence had to offer, so if you liked her debut I'd say pick this up and ignore the rest of my review. 😅

The Writing:
This book definitely isn't bad; in fact it's very very readable. The writing structure has very simple sentences that fly by. Even just comparing it to the book I read before this one, I'm able to complete double the information in the same amount of time, maybe even more!

The Romance???:
But I don't care. And, in fact, now that the author has started seeding how handsome one of the men is and how she's jealous when he's having a normal conversation with a female colleague he's known for years I am literally, physically rolling my eyes at the romance developments. That's not what I'm here for, that's not what I want from this book, it's not what I wanted from Dead Silence either and I can just see this developing in the same way that makes me uncomfortable and honestly a little cringe.

Immorally Extravagant Wealth:
And as a minor nitpick-- I also don't understand why the main character is 1. excessively wealthy, 2. literally SO wealthy that she's on par with Bezos/Elon Musk (in modern terms), 3. why the distant future would compare wealth to the Carnegies of all references???, 4. why she's also -apparently- so unwealthy that she's had to scrounge for coins. It doesn't feel like it serves the plot or story, but only serves as an opportunity for the author to soapbox her political views (via the mouthpieces of the characters, of course). It's so oddly jarring and incessantly commented on in the story.

<i>Ghost Station</i> is S.A. Barnes' second sci-fi horror novel, following on the accomplishment of <i>Dead Silence</i>, itself a tremendously entertaining book. While <i>Dead Silence</i> read like a blockbuster thrill ride, <i>Ghost Station</i> feels much more reserved, trading on dread and its psychological conflict to drive its story forward.

Despite the slightly slower pace of <i>Ghost Station</i>, Barnes suffuses the story with plenty of conflict, both external and internal. The politics of the book are much more pronounced here than in <i>Dead Silence,</i> with a greater emphasis on problems of the cultural gap between the über-rich and the working class. The novel's protagonist, Ophelia, is forced to navigate her seeming privilege with the fundamental lack thereof of the crew she is assigned to assist as they travel to a distant planet for a survey. Ophelia's conflict with the crew mirrors a conflict she feels inside herself, navigating her own personal history to try to figure out where she actually stands.

Ophelia's transformation throughout the book is its most compelling psychological core, and it's the conflict from which any other conflict erupts in the book. Ophelia is a resultingly complex character, with conflictory ideals and decisions that showcase her strengths and her flaws. The book, as a result, feels much less like a story of an encounter between humans and aliens, and more like an encounter with humans-as-aliens--an introspective dive into what it means to be a human, what it means to share community, what it means to build an identity.

On reflection over the book, what stands out to me is how rich this book's human interior really is, and how the overarching plot of the book, the actual "Ghost Station" itself, really only seems to exist in service to that human conflict as central theme. There remain some unexplained threads in the book, some aspects that don't ever end up fully resolved, and yet that's also kind of the point the book has to make: human life and human relationships don't always come fully formed or fully resolvable. Instead, we make the best of what we have, what we can do, and grow along the way.

<i>Ghost Station</i> shares some similarities with Barnes's previous work, but manages to say something almost wholly and entirely different, and it's only further evidence of my absolute adoration for the kind of stories she has to tell. I genuinely hope we've got a third sci-fi horror from her coming in the future, because I crave these stories.

S.A. Barnes has the formula down for sci-fi and paranormal horror. Fans of Dead Silence can expect the same amount of build-up, suspense, and locked-room mystery vibes. The twists, the tension, and the dynamics make this a breeze to read even as your on the edge of your seat.

Before I get into the review, a quick thank you to both NetGalley and the publishers over at Tor for giving me access to this ARC in exchange for an honest review. Ghost Station follows Dr. Bray who has joined an expedition to a far off planet to explore and obtain samples for a major corporation. Her job as a therapist is to make sure the crew avoids developing a mental illness that leads to homicidal tendencies. But when mysterious things start happening once the crew is planet-side there’s not a lot she can do to keep the horrors from coming. Ghost Station comes out on April 9th and is available for preorder now.

It’s hard to write the review for this one because I was so hyped for it. I read and really enjoyed the first book by this author so I went in with high expectations. Dead Silence got a 4 star rating from me so, with more experience, I expected this author’s second book to blow me away. It just didn’t happen. I think part of that is a preferences thing. We follow these characters planet-side to explore what was previously an inhabited city so they can learn what was on this alien planet centuries ago and also what it’s made of. All of which would get reported back to the company that hired them. But in Dead Silence we were in actual space for most of the story. And I think that IS one of the main factors here for me. I LOVE SciFi/Horror as a genre mashup and, while this is still that, it felt less SciFi leaning this time around due to being so grounded on a planet. I also found that the author picked up a new trick or piece of writerly advice that drove me up the wall. Almost every single chapter ended with a few sentences of absolutely horrifying images or situations. Only for it to be discovered on the next page to be a misunderstanding. Found a random tooth? No, you didn’t, it’s a comm. Found a dead body? No, you didn’t, it’s a space suit laid out on the ground. Dumb stuff like that that would frustrate me so much. Let’s actually take the story there or not write this deceiving chapter ending for no reason.

I still enjoyed the setting and the characters. I think the author does a really good job on building the world and the people who move around inside of it. I would have loved to see even more of this ancient civilization that lived on the planet they’re studying. It was so interesting in the moments we got to explore. It felt unique and still somehow realistic, you know, for an alien planet. I also love the technology that the author invented for this story. Some of it is stuff we’ve seen in other sci-fi novels, but with the author’s own twist which I enjoyed. I also enjoyed how the author managed to incorporate tech in some of the horrific moments. It dialed into the SciFi/Horror mash up so well.

Overall, it was still a fast and fun read for me. I don’t know that I could ever truly dislike a SciFi/Horror mash up. It was definitely worth my time.

After Dead Silence, I couldn’t wait to read this book! I don’t do space horror but it seems for Miss Barnes I’ll do it. This was fantastic, and was definitely not what I expected. I will say that the main character annoyed me a little bit, but hey, to each their own.

Thanks to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the ARC of this book! It’ll be out in April!

I received a gifted copy of GHOST STATION by S.A. Barnes from Tor Publishing!

GHOST STATION follows psychologist Ophelia Bray. Her field of study is ERS, a mental condition that can develop in space, one that has historically led to a brutal murder spree. This is a cause close to Ophelia's heart and her past. She's put into cold sleep and sent to join a crew that has recently lost one of their members. The idea is to address the mental health concerns sooner than waiting for them to finish their work and return home.

Working with the small crew, Ophelia sees the need for help even as the crew don't exactly welcome her interventions. It doesn't take long before she begins to see signs of more going on than she expected, and she is not out of danger herself.

I really loved Barnes' DEAD SILENCE last year, so this was a highly anticipated read for me. The book started off well for me, but I sadly didn't entirely feel the same connection to this book as I did with DEAD SILENCE. There were a few moments of tension that I enjoyed, but the pace felt a bit slow to me in other places.

I did enjoy the idea of mental health services in space and some of the discussions that came out of that. There is representation for past trauma and that leads to a lot of questions in the text. There are also complicated relationships with family and the crew that gave a lot to unpack.

This wound up being a book I liked, but didn't love and didn't feel quite as compelled to binge. That said, I definitely will pick up more from this author in the future.

Dr Ophelia Bray, a psychologist, is joining a small crew going from planet to planet, basically marking claims for their company. Her intent is to help prevent a sort of space madness before it has a chance set in, as it is much more difficult to treat once sufferers return planet side. She's also looking to escape some bad press, and bad feelings after a patient of hers committed suicide by jumping of the office building she worked out of. To further complicate her life, she is the related to the family running a company in direct competition to her employer.

Ophelia has been chose to join this particular small crew as they recently suffered as loss that seems to be attributed to the space madness (I think they called ERS, but I can't recall what that stood for!) Unfortunately, the crew doesn't want her there and does not trust her intentions. Despite this, she attempts to earn their trust so that she can help prevent the ERS and prove to her employers, and herself, that she is good at her job.

As the crew and Ophelia spend time on their first assigned planet it is obvious that none of them were given all the information they needed to safely gather samples and complete their mission as there is something very... very wrong.

While I did not find myself enjoying this title as much as Barnes previous space endeavor, Dead Silence, it was still very enjoyable. Barnes kept me interested in what was happening on the planet and how.. or if.. the crew would be able to survive, as well as expertly weaving in Ophelia's trouble backstory.

“Then again, guilt doesn’t always work logically. It might simply be someone with an overactive conscience, taking on blame they don’t deserve but can’t seem to shake, nonetheless. People are strange like that. “

Ghost Station by S.A. Barnes

Release Date: April 9, 2024

Thank you @NetGalley & Tor Publishing Group for this copy of #GhostStation. Now let’s get right to the point.

Ever have a book you were really excited about and been left down at the end? That’s how I felt about Ghost Station, the authors first book Dead Silence was so good I flew through it. This one felt like nothing happened for over half the book and then when it started to pick up it was so jumbled and all over the place it didn’t make any sense.

The idea is there but the execution on this one for me was not it.

I got this one from NetGalley and was so excited as I was a big fan of Dead Silence. I unfortunately started reading it at a rough time for me, so it took me so long to get through that I actually switched to the audio. Zura Johnson did a good job, and there were several accents, which always impresses me.

This novel mixes a lot of what you’ve already seen out of other sci-fi horrors. Not that I’m in any way the expert, having only seen/watched some of them (Event Horizon, Alien, Life+). Not necessarily that something needs to be original for me to enjoy it, however, if I’m being honest, there was unfortunately nothing exciting about this. This one followed along the same path as Dead Silence, where there is an incredible amount of set up, but it did not work on me twice. Where the first hit me at the right time, and the long opening added to the cabin-fever feel of the narration, this one didn’t work.

The main character has a haunted, hidden past. And although it is continuously mentioned as a major secret, when it is eventually revealed, it does virtually nothing to the plot or climax. While it was supposed to show the lead overcoming expectations, it just read as flat to me. The stakes feel too low with them being on another planet—one which does not have a breathable atmosphere.

There is one point where I felt the novel was shifting toward a big change. They wanted to leave but were stuck in the station during a snow storm. It was still quite late for a climax to start, but I thought it might have been shifting towards a more classic, claustrophobic-isolation horror (just in space). Instead it just kind of continued off the rails. Really wanted to love this one, but it fumbled most of the landing for me. 2.5/5*

*4.5 stars rounded up*

The year is 2199 & Dr. Ophelia Bray is traveling with a Reclamation & Exploration team through outer space, on a mission to take samples on a planet that has ruins of an ancient civilization for the corporation that just purchased it from another conglomerate (outer space & all its planets have been turned into a for-profit enterprise). The original owners left a space station structure there that should be vacant & ready for them to use… but are Dr. Bray & her team really the only ones there?

This book was all kinds of spooky with a pleasantly surprising dose of introspection & personal growth on the part of our main character, Ophelia. She’s a psychologist determined to help prevent cases of a violent mental health disorder called ERS, which can occur in people doing a large amount of space travel. There are many contributing factors that cause ERS, one of them being the cramped conditions that come with living on other planets - which is why the cavernous space station they arrive at is such a surprise, & an eerie one at that. As Dr. Bray works to develop a rapport with her team in hopes of them opening up & trusting her, she has to battle flashbacks to her own past on a space station similar to this one.

I really enjoyed all of the new technology described in this book (particularly the autodrillers that one of the team members had named) & found the depictions of future society to be thoughtful & complex (also mildly terrifying). I’ll definitely have to read this author’s other space horror novel because I now know that this is a genre I enjoy!

Thank you to NetGalley & Tor Nightfire for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

4 stars

I absolutely adored Dead Silence, and so was raring to get my hands on the next sci-fi horror novel from Barnes. While it had some early stumbling blocks, Ghost Station didn’t disappoint.

[Note: Ghost Station is a standalone novel, not a sequel to Dead Silence, but there are significant similarities in their plots and themes and I will be comparing the two in my review as I explain what about Ghost Station did and didn’t work for me]

I think the book wrapped things up quite well, but struggled somewhat with the buildup. I found the first chapter very confusing (which, to be fair, happens with a lot of sci-fi as you’re thrust into an unfamiliar world, but I was heavily dependent on the blurb to understand what was happening in the first chapter). From there, I got a firm handle on our setting, but in the middle chapters I got very frustrated with Ophelia, the main character; it was only in the final third of the book that I really felt gripped. That final third, though, won me over entirely.

About Ophelia: During the first half of the book, I kept finding myself thinking back to Dead Silence. The protagonist in that book was psychologically unstable and sometimes irrational, but it really worked in the narrative; you understood her trauma and uneasy relationship with reality from the beginning, and it added to the horror story and atmosphere. In Ghost Station, Ophelia is written similarly, but without the scaffolding that justified (to me) that behavior. The protagonist in Dead Silence is a mass-casualty survivor twice over, now forced to revisit the site in deep space where her latest trauma occurred. Ophelia, however, is a trained psychologist, who signed up for and is sent on a mission to a dead alien planet; yet she acts unstable and flighty from the very beginning, her psychological issues causing her to routinely space out and make stupid, potentially dangerous errors in routine tasks. What made sense in the protagonist of Dead Silence seems wildly improper for someone in Ophelia’s job, to the point of sometimes threatening my suspension of disbelief.

I understand that Barnes is trying to establish her as the outsider, the green team psychologist instead of a hardened explorer, but I think that point was strained. I also understand that Ophelia is revealed to have serious trauma of her own, but that past trauma is better triggered by later events; having her absent-mindedly wander away from a safety line on DAY ONE because she’s thinking about how spooky it is to be on a dead planet, and having to be walked back to the line by the team leader, just felt like pushing her weaknesses too quickly in the book.

The other characters: I really liked Ethan, who gets some nice fleshing-out and character progression. I wish the other characters got more of this treatment as well, as it’s a very small and intimate team, but for the most part we only scratch their surface. As for the off-screen characters, we get a lot of good stuff on Ophelia’s family backstory, but I am sometimes left wanting; it’s hinted that there’s more to learn about Uncle Darwin and his relationship with Ophelia, but this is never delivered. I also wanted to learn more about her relationship with her sister.

I know I’ve nitpicked a lot, but honestly, it’s because I really like S.A. Barnes and had high expectations for this book. And where it delivers, it really delivers; the alien world is creepy (I wanted more! More! Especially about the planet’s native inhabitants) and the remnants of the last human team to land here provide a delicious atmosphere in which our protagonists slowly put pieces together, which is very satisfying. Ophelia’s issues with her father, in particular, are really well done, and fit super well into her navigating the current crisis.

To sum up: It’s a slow burn, and Ophelia isn’t my favorite protagonist for the first half of the book or so, but the climax is worth it. If you like <i> Alien, </i> you’ll like this book. If you like family history and psychological trauma colliding with horror, you’ll like this book. If you liked <i> Whalefall </i> or <i> Leech, </i> you’ll probably like this book. If you don’t like sci-fi horror, you will not like this book. But if you do, I definitely think you should give it a chance. I will certainly be reading whatever Barnes comes out with next.

I really enjoyed this book. It was so creepy and has me wondering what the heck was going on the entire book. I loved the sci-fi and supernatural aspects in the book

Ghost Station by S.A. Barnes almost reads like old-school science fiction.

"A psychologist is embedded with an exploration team after one of their crew dies on a previous mission. They land on an abandoned planet to explore. But there's a reason the previous explorers left. Something is not right..."

This narrative moves very slowly. A lot of time is spent in the psycholigt's head - mostly because she has a lot of secrets. There's a lot of discussion without a lot of activity - not really the expectation of a sci-fi read.
I like the science fiction aspect. There's no world building - just an acknowlegment of some technology being used without a lot of explanation. It always has a name so you can tell what it is (Med Kit) There are some creepy moments - eventually. The reveal was kind of an "Oh - is that it?"

Probably a good pick if you like slow pace sci-fi.

It is hard to put into words how good this book is. The setting is haunting, the narrator is unreliable, and it's impossible to not care about the character's. It kept me guessing, slightly unnerved, and delighted!

I feel soooo disappointed. This one just fell a bit too flat for me. I loved the authors last book so much and I had such high expectations for this but unfortunately I was left feeling like this wasn't the same author.
It was listed as horror, but it didn't feel like one. There was no true suspense or horror moments, more so a slight mysterious air that really went no where. The ending was kinda abrupt in that we didn't really get a lot of answers or explanations..
I hope this was just a fluke and the next book from this author is more akin to the first one.

This novel was extremely entertaining and very unique! I was not sure what to expect when I first started reading this, and I really thought the story was going to veer into a completely different direction than it did. I have never been much of a fan of stories set in space, but this one won me over. I want to read everything S.A. Barnes writes going forward! Give this novel a chance if you are hesitant about reading anything in the sci-fi genre but would like to give it a try. This was so much fun, very spooky, and horrific in ways I did not expect!

I'm not quite sure where to begin here, I loved Dead Silence and I was so excited for another novel by the author but this definitely fell short of my expectations, and it's hard to not compare it to Dead Silence in terms of my enjoyment. I love space horror, because space on it's own is terrifying and has so many risks and unknowns that it makes a perfect setting for some really out there horror. With this book we get psychologist Ophelia Bray who goes on a mission to a new planet with a team to claim the planet for the company she works for. Ophelia is very self aware about a lot of her personality flaws due to her training, but also surprisingly unaware of a lot of the more important aspects of herself (I'm purposefully being vague so as to not spoil anything). I couldn't quite figure her out, sometimes she felt very juvenile and other times she felt like a totally different person, and despite her (in theory) being a very smart person, she knows going on this mission will be extremely triggering for her and goes anyway, putting everyone on the ship in danger. And the side characters felt so flat that I don't even remember their names anymore, which is a shame because they were an important part of the story, but they really just get boiled down to stereotypes (grumpy leader with a heart of gold, innocent young girl, tough woman, etc). I think the biggest thing for me that fell short though were the horror aspects. I personally did not find this to be very scary at all and didn't give me any of the creepy feelings that I had while reading Dead Silence. I would definitely classify this more as a thriller than anything else, honestly. I also had so many questions that went unanswered, such as the ancient aliens who lived on the planet and what happened to them. And then, the book just kind of...ended. It wasn't a very satisfying ending for me at all. I'm so upset because I was really looking forward to this and it just ended up being okay. I'll still probably pick up their next book if they do another space horror because this one easily could just be the outlier for me.

Ghost Station by S.A. Barnes was received directly from the publisher and I chose to review it. I had not read this author before and I was not overly impressed with this book. I will never give a fiction book less than three stars but I will say why I gave it three (of five) stars. The book was too slow. The beginning failed to "hook" me so it was chore reading the whole thing. I did not connect with any characters and when it did finally pick up, almost half way through the book, it went too fast. I did not feel it was "horror" either. It also seemed maybe this was a Young Adult book? I don't see that it is marketed that way but the writing made me check several times if it was YA. That is my opinion and manny think otherwise.

3 Stars

After the fantastic debut release of Dead Silence, I was excited to dive into Ghost Station. Unfortunately, this effort didn't live up to its predecessor. Ophelia was an intriguing character, but ultimately I didn't care enough about her to be invested in her adventure. I found her easier to dislike than like, that's a strange place for the protagonist to exist. I felt the crew needed more development to better understand their dynamic, which encompassed a large amount of the story.
The bright spot for me was the claustrophobic feel while in the hab. The isolation and largely unknown of why it's in the condition it's in and abandoned was solid. Also, the suspense behind the cause of the crews demise had my attention. I dug the aliens quite a bit and wish their story could have been expanded. Even though Ghost Station didn't check all the boxes I still enjoyed it and I will be looking forward to the next sci-fi book from S.A. Barnes.

Ghost Station is a claustrophobic space nightmare!

Psychologist Dr. Ophelia Bray finds herself sent out to space after dealing with bad press after a patient kills himself on her watch. She decides therapy on board a spaceship might get ahead of some of the issues patients develop. Unbeknownst to her, this space station her new crew is heading towards has a history of its own and something ancient is waiting for them.

I thought this was such a neat concept and S.A. Barnes once again has made sci-fi accessible and fun to a dummy like me. There’s a really interesting cast of characters and so much interesting history. Ghost Station delves into personal traumas, healing, and a whole lot of grief. There was an intriguing back story at play, and I thought that added a lot to the story!

I wish our MC was presented as more of a professional instead of coming apart at the seams the entire time. It made it a little hard to believe her role. I also found the pacing to not grip me the same way Dead Silence did. Because of that, I couldn’t fully feel terrified as I should have.