Mmm, sadly this was not a winner for me. I LOVED Dead Silence, it is still one of the scariest books I've ever read, but this one was SO boring for the first 40%, and then once we finally got to the alien planet, nothing was described well enough to be genuinely unsettling. Sure, the stuff was objectively scary and gross, but the writing just hadn't drawn me in and by the end I just wanted it to be over.

It was a pretty interesting read. If you want a story that's exciting and set in space, this one will do. I did think the ending was a little rushed, but if you're looking for quick and thrilling this will do!

I’ve been playing through Starfield (at a creepingly slow pace) and this reminds me of something you’d come across on a quest line. Some sort of abandoned science facility - like, literally what this book is about! So much fun.

I had a great time with this book. It was so mysterious, on many levels. The main character had secrets. There was some mystery surrounding the history of the planet the space crew is visiting. Mystery surrounding a death of a previous crew member. So much mystery! And it kept it up until the end. I was heavily invested in this story.

But I also have some critiques. If we’re dealing with anything sci-fi or fantasy related, I need that well fleshed out and well described. I don’t think this author does that particularly well. I remember feeling that way with her previous book as well. I also felt that part of the conflict at the end, something that felt really dire and huge, had a lackluster and easy solution. It seemed like just for the sake of getting it wrapped up nicely.

Overall, I liked this a lot. It was exciting and strange. A great space horror novel

I was really drawn in by Ghost Station initially, but then my interest came and went as I continued reading. The setting was a little bland, especially compared to Dead Silence. The characters weren't very compelling and I've honestly already forgotten all of their names. There were some very interesting details in the setting of the abandoned planet, especially when we get glimpses of those who lived there before. Unfortunately, those aspects weren't explored very thoroughly. I did enjoy the plot and the explanation of why the planet was so hastily abandoned though. There were definitely some tense and creepy moments. The basic story premise was enough to keep me reading, and although I can't see myself ever rereading this book, I don't regret reading Ghost Station.

I loved Dead Silence, the previous space horror book by this author, so I was really looking forward to reading this. And again, she does not disappoint with this one. Ghost Station is a creepy space horror story that keeps you guessing and is a real page-turner. Each character is different and that helps to add to the story. The author does a great job building the tension between characters. Once you start reading this book, you won't want to put it down. If you enjoyed Dead Silence, you will enjoy this book too. I recommend it to all horror fans!

3.5 stars. A decent sci-fi tale about a space exploration team researching a desolate, abandoned planet. The main character spends a lot of time agonizing over her past and her family’s misdeeds, which I found to be a bit tiring and repetitive. Other than that, I liked the characters and adventure. Very atmospheric but not overly horrific.

It’s official, S.A. Barnes is an awesome writer. I loved Dead Silence and was concerned that her new book would not be as good. No worries, Ghost Station is amazing. Full of interesting characters with undeniable chemistry, smart and funny dialogues, a creepy, Gothic atmosphere that is not easy to achieve in space, and a fantastic plot that never lets up. Ophelia has been trying to run away from her heritage all her life, so she joins an exploration crew on a distant planet. All the elements of a successful haunting are there but with an original take. The storm that always rages outside may be the same but instead of a big castle, we get an abandoned hab module and the ghost in chains is something else. Or is it? Ophelia has devoted her life to studying a psychological condition that causes hallucinations but no one knows too well how it works yet. And that was one of my favorite parts. The casual references to their own world. Medical conditions that have been normalized because space travel is no big deal. The lingo, the food, the medical technology (of course somebody badly injured needs a well-trained AI, stat!) This is a world in which humans live in space and the technology would be unfathomable to anyone alive today. But the plot is the real winner. Twisty, addictive and very well thought out, it is a real page turner. Fun and horrifying all at once, I loved, loved this novel!
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, #NetGalley/#Tor Publishing Group, Tor Nightfire.

Overall, I didn’t enjoy this as much as Dead Silence. I couldn’t really get into the main character, even though I thought she was well developed; as were the other characters. I liked the intensity building, but was a little disheartened by not getting all the answers.

S.A. Barnes is quickly becoming a go to for sci-fi thriller/horror, a genre I’d really love to see a lot more of. And while I think I enjoyed her debut, Dead Silence, more, I still found Ghost Station to be an engaging adventure. In fact I not only read the ARC but also had the opportunity to listen to an advanced copy of the audiobook. Zura Johnson’s narration is quite good so I’m pleased to say you can’t go wrong no matter how you choose to experience Ghost Station. I really liked how we continued to learn things about Ophelia, instead of just getting one big info dump. Ophelia is a psychologist specializing in studying ERS (think space madness, often characterized by violent outbursts, with one case resulting in the murder of nearly thirty souls.). At the start when we meet Ophelia it’s clear she is determined to get away from home, away from most of her family (which we learn more about later on) and she joins a small crew whose on a mission to explore a planet that’s been abandoned. They’ll be taking up temporary residence in an abandoned station not far from ancient alien ruins. Her crew mates are an interesting mix of characters, with many of them not at all interested in getting to know to her, with some resenting her for she is and her family, some not at all pleased to even have her along. Ophelia senses the crew is keeping stuff from her, but what? The atmosphere and sense of isolation is well developed. And of course she has questions as to why exactly was this station abandoned? Then one of the crew is found murdered. Who did it? What is going on? Can they trust each other? Is someone suffering from ERS or is it something else? Something worse? I’d like to thank Tor Publishing Group, Tor Nightfire, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review an eARC of Ghost Station and Macmillan Audio for the chance to listen to an advanced copy of the audio version.

Sat down in the lobby of the Alumni Center before my department retreat day to finish this VERY spooky ARC.

Reading this over a very cold, extra-days weekend was PERFECT. If I may quote the book: “Space is cold.”

I really enjoyed Dead Silence so was excited to get this one by Barnes..

This effort doesn't have the dread that Dead Silence had; it doesn't give itself enough time to open up, organically create and atmosphere and draw us in. The scene is almost immediately set for us, ominous warnings abound so you go in looking for the cracks. I prefer to have what I thought was solid give out from under me, then already being tentative about every interaction and potential clue.

As I sat to write this a few things bothered me, which mostly had to do with information provided that had no payoff. Phes patient on that fateful day (was that the source of any of the media? Or was it something else?). Her family. The paper flowers. Etc. It just all seemed a little too scattered..

The (off) world itself was good and I wish we got to spend more time with Ethan and his crew away from Ophelia. I rarely say this but more than one POV would have helped the narrative here. So it's less space horror and more the space version of domestic alien thriller.

💥💥. Book Review 💥💥

Ghost Station
By S.A. Barnes
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ stars


This book obscures the lines between horror and sci-fi. This was my first read from S.A. Barnes. I have never read a book that had to do with space and other planets, so that was new to me. It was a very intriguing book and at times claustrophobic. There is a lot of suspense, mystery, and intrigue that Barnes puts the reader through in the book. The cosmic world Barnes puts us in is out of this world.


Thank you to NetGalley, S.A. Barnes, and Tor Publishing Group for providing me with a free ebook in exchange for an honest review.

Set in a future where teams explore new worlds, this story of a psychologist assigned to the team exploring a world where something went wrong on the previous expedition, is both horrifying and claustrophobic. Not so much action as it explores the ghosts within all the characters and the terrifying experiences that shape us. I found the book enjoyable and dark. I hope to read more by this author.

Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for an ARC of this title..

I really wanted to love this one and I felt like it was just okay. The pacing was a bit slow and I reallllly did not like any of the characters especially the main character. I did like that some parts were creepy, but I definitely wanted more of that. I have heard really great things about the authors other work, so I will give that a try.

I liked Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes, so I jumped at the chance to read Ghost Station. She writes great space horror! A psychiatrist is sent on a deep space reconnaissance mission with a crew who doesn’t want her there. She’s working through past trauma and dealing with secrets in her past, as is everyone on board. They get to an abandoned station on a far away planet with alien ruins, and people start showing symptoms of…something. But they’re stuck on the planet because of bad storms, and it could just be a sickness that people get from being in space too long. You’ll have to read and find out! :)

Once the plot reached a certain point, the tension and action were ratcheted up and I didn’t want to stop reading. I really couldn’t put the book down at the end. It was intense, and so good. It wasn’t just the horror aspect- I liked how the characters grew as they worked through their personal issues and how relationships strengthened as they got to know each other better. There was a lot of buildup to the plot taking off, but it pays off. I recommend it! I comes out April 9. Thank you to Tor Nightfire and NetGalley for the eARC.

In my perpetual hunt for haunted spaceships I was excited last year to find Dead Silence, S.A. Barnes’s space horror debut. If you haven’t read that one and you love horror and sci-fi, I definitely recommend it. After having read Dead Silence I went straight to twitter to look up the author and was delighted to see that she’s got another space horror book coming out, Ghost Station.

I received an ARC of Ghost Station from Tor Publishing through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review of the book.

The book follows Ophelia Bray, daughter of an extremely wealthy and powerful family who run a company called Pinnacle. Her relationship with every last one of her family members except her sister is not just strained but extremely antagonistic, and that antagonism paired with her family’s Lords of Capitalism Assholery are a large part of what drove Ophelia to seek out a profession as a psychiatrist and to find a job working for her family’s company’s competitor, Montrose. But it’s Ophelia’s struggle with her own feelings of guilt that truly drive most of her decisions, including prompting her to take a very remote assignment for her company; the book opens with Ophelia preparing to enter cold sleep for a long interstellar trip out to accompany a corporate Reclamation and Exploration (R&E) team staking a claim for Montrose, on a far-flung planet once inhabited by now-extinct sentient life, while her family makes one final attempt to convince her not to go.
Her official reason for accompanying the R&E team is to act as an on-site psychiatrist in an effort to help reduce the risk of psychological problems arising from the stress, isolation, and long periods of cold sleep that their jobs entail, especially as this team has recently suffered the loss of a team member—a loss Ophelia suspects is more complicated than the team lets on.

The team themselves clearly don’t want Ophelia there, with reactions to her presence ranging from cool and aloof to openly hostile, with the exception of one team member who is portrayed as more vulnerable but also younger, less mature, and more naïve. It is with this inauspicious start that Ophelia finds herself descending with a mostly-hostile, secretive team to a poorly-understood, inhospitable alien planet, where things take a turn from bad to worse.

From the jump, the threading together of Ophelia’s openly acknowledged motivations and the secrets she keeps about her past is deftly handled. It’s immediately clear that there are some things that Ophelia not only refuses to talk about with others but also does her best to refuse engaging with in her own mind. The hints laid throughout the text early in the book give shape to those secrets without explicitly defining them, in a way that keeps interest without becoming annoying. The character interactions are well-written, varied, and keep the tension high even in between the scares. Clues are trickled out in a mix of obvious moments and more subtle hints that makes it easy for the reader to second-guess the situation in a way that feels intriguing and natural rather than obfuscating, and because of that it is easy too for the reader to understand oversights on the characters’ parts. All the pieces are woven throughout the narrative so that when it’s time to wrap the story up it feels neither painfully obvious nor contrived, and very satisfying.

The whole book was a fun, enjoyable, unsettling read, but there are two aspects in which I feel Barnes really excels.

First, throughout the book there is a growing sense of unease, dread, and even disgust. The team’s natural inclination to pranks, and their expectation of being pranked in turn, make it so easy for Ophelia and for the reader to feel wrong-footed throughout the first half of the book. Is this something to be concerned about, or is it the R&E team playing a joke? Is this something uncanny, or was it the previous team indulging in some malicious mischief? The book puts your guard up or gets your guard down by turns, so that the thing you can really expect is that whatever you’re looking at isn’t quite what it seems. It’s hard to pull off an unreliable narrator who the reader wants to believe in even if they can’t believe them, but Ophelia is just that. The book didn’t have the literary equivalent of jump-scares, but it didn’t need them, relying instead on an ever-increasing dread and paranoia that was deftly handled.

Second, the underlying theme of guilt—both earned and unearned, both resolved and unresolved—was powerfully woven. From guilt that was wrongly put on Ophelia’s shoulders by others, to undeserved guilt she assigns to herself, to the guilt she actually owns, Ophelia has a lot to face. The themes of guilt and accountability would be powerful enough if Ophelia only had to resolve her unearned feelings of guilt over situations that were out of her control, or if she only had to reckon with her actual complicity in situations which she could have changed but chose not to. But Barnes crafted a story in which Ophelia had to both forgive herself and let go of guilt that was not hers and accept and resolve guilt that she did have a part in. Doing both at once could have wound up clunky, but Barnes wove them together deftly in a way that caused each aspect of the guilt theme to highlight and strengthen the other, and resolved it satisfyingly. I was very impressed.

The only thing about the book that I wish had been different is more of a me-problem than anything else—my memory is so poor, and Barnes introduced a whole handful of corporate acronyms pretty quickly, which left me flipping back through pages to figure out what people were talking about more than once.

I’ll wrap it up by saying that I loved the way the resolution of the story felt tidy and well-resolved but still left enough threads open that I can sit here and hope for a sequel without feeling frustrated by the end of the book. Whether S.A. Barnes does write a direct sequel to this book or not, I absolutely hope that she gives me more of the space horror I crave.

I was aware of this author after her debut, Dead Silence, was popping up everywhere. Sci-fi horror is my jam but the reactions to Dead Silence were so mixed that I've been hesitant to check it out, something I'll correct after reading Ghost Station.

It's not peak *chef's kiss* literature but this is some solid sci-fi horror. The author's inspiration screams through - Event Horizon, Dead Space, Aliens, The Thing, Tacoma, The Expanse, etc in the descriptions of the setting (both space ship, space station, and alien planet), the characters, the world building, even the situation. I don't want to get more specific than this as it will give away parts of the story, lol, but I will say that when I got to the description of their ship quarters I was immediately picturing the Lewis & Clark from Event Horizon lmao

It is a slow build as well, though the end goes wild and gets gross, and then we get a kind of silly fairy tale ending but, again, in an Event Horizon way, so... I can see some not wanting to go through the journey though, but I loved the world-building and setting, especially as Barnes does employ a cool plot device - this is a universe in which yeah, there are aliens, but all the humans see of them are ruins. Ruins so old that little can be gleaned. I thought this was just a little nugget of world-building, just a little tickle for setting-reason, but it turns out to be a big plot point and one I really liked and would love to see more of in the genre. There's something so deeply sad about humans going out into the final frontier and finding everyone else is already dead. Or maybe I just want to re-watch Stargate: Universe after reading this.

I honestly deeply enjoyed Ghost Station though, in the same way I enjoy ice cream - it's not healthy or much substance but it still tastes good. The only part that gave me a bad taste were the random occasionaly paragraphs attempting to set up some romance between the MC and the ship's Captain... and it's just as goofy and awkward as you can imagine. Two people, never met before, don't have a good first impression or impressions of each other in general, are going through something incredible stressful and horrific (mentally, emotionally, and physically!) and the aliens are more realistic than these two lusting after each other. Every time was jarring and you could literally remove any sentences referring to the romance and change nothing else. Especially as none of the characters are particularly likable? It feels very shoehorned. Either these two characters needed a history, or the romance should've remained light flirting, or the promise of a potential for more at the end of the story, any of which would have felt more natural in the situation. Anyway, I dedicated this entire paragraph to, maybe, two paragraphs worth of romance in the entire book haha so don't let this dissuade you, as it really barely appears. I just have a lot of feelings about insta-love, quick romances, and a general lack of 'read the room' when it comes to the fiction I consume.

The audiobook is quite good as well, though the narrator, Zura Johnson, has a Shatner rhythm when they're reading, unless they're doing the character voices. Takes some getting used to lol

It kind of ends open-ended and I wouldn't mind a sequel.

I am so thankful to Tor Nightfire, S.A. Barnes, and Netgalley for granting me advanced audio and digital access to this title before it hits shelves on April 9, 2024. I really enjoyed the dialogue and narratives of this book and look forward to more of this artist's work to come.

Stars: 2.5 out of 5.

I come to the conclusion that I don't like how this author writes her protagonists. I had that problem with her previous book, and it's even worse in this one. Ophelia is a horrible person, at least in my opinion, and instead of punishing her for her shortcomings and making her grow up and become a better human being, the author rewards her for them.

I mean who you have a protagonist that LIED about her past to get the job she has now. Mind you, this job is to help people suffering from a psychological condition that can make them violent and delusional. Moreover, this is a condition Ophelia is very familiar with because her father had it... yes, that's the part she lied about. Oh, and she also has PTSD from her experience with things her father did, and a plethora of other psychological issues herself, yet she thinks she can be objective enough to help others with this? I mean how self-absorbed do you have to be to think that this is okay?

Also, no professional board in their right mind would ever authorize something like that, so no wonder she had to lie about her identity. Oh, and use the influence and money of the family she despises so much just to get what she wants. So it's okay to disparage your relatives and pretend that you are better than them, but still use their name when it suits you... okay then.

Not only that, but Ophelia also accepts a posting that will put her in the precise situation that will trigger her PTSD. She know is, in fact, she mentions is a few times... yet she fights tooth and nail to still get that position. I mean is that supposed to endear her to me? If this protagonist spent even a moment thinking about anyone other than herself, she would realize that she is the LAST person that needs to go on this mission. That by going she is putting everyone else in danger. She is supposed to provide psychological counseling and stability to the crew put under difficult conditions. How is she supposed to do that when she has several psychological breakdowns just being in an abandoned space station? But no, that thought doesn't even cross her mind.

And, as I mentioned before, the author thinks this is perfectly normal and in fact brave of Ophelia to do that. She is rewarded for being this reckless and selfish at every turn. She is saved from though situations by plot armor and deus ex machina solutions.

That's the other issue I have with this book - the ending is extremely underwhelming, just like the previous book by her, Dead Silence, has been. We get this huge buildup with so many mysteries and horrors... and it all circles back to the evil corporation will be evil trope.. that we already saw in the previous book as well. This is getting old, and it cheapens the plot, in my opinion.

As for the supporting characters, there is really nothing much to say about them. They are more a collection of stereotypes than realized individuals. We have the gruff team leader with a hidden heart of gold who will become the protagonist's possible love interest. Then we have the rude macho dude that hates her from the get go (for good reasons, mind you). And another male character that might as well be a non-entity. As for females, we have the b76chy female that will turn out to be evil, and a sweet young innocent girl that everybody wants to protect. Actually, if you look at the cast of characters in this book and compare it to the characters in Dead Silence, they are identical. Only the names changed.

I think I'm done with this author. Their stories sound so great when you read the blurb, and the covers are top notch, but the execution is sorely lacking, at least in my opinion.

PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to Tor Nightfire and NetGalley for the free galley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was a huge disappointment for me. I own but have not read the author’s other space horror novel Dead Silence, which has been recommended to me by several. So I went into this one with some excitement. Alien is one of my favorite films of all time after all and space is absolutely terrifying as a concept.

This book was a struggle. The premise is great and there are some excellent body horror and creepy psychological horror moments. They are there but they are interspersed by glacial (and I mean slooooow) pacing. I love a good slow burn as long there is something holding me into the story and that makes me want to keep turning the pages. This was not that. The characters were not interesting, the MC constantly inserting her inner monologue during and after every interaction with another character was repetitive and not interesting. A couple of scenes that should have been SCARY and tense were bogged down by unnecessary descriptions, weird allusions to past events when they weren’t necessary to the moment, and lots of metaphors. I was skimming after the 60% mark and still got a gist of the story.

Ultimately I think there is a really good novella here if the story and prose was tightened up. It is really difficult to hold tension over a longer work, especially in a single location setting like this. The writing is not bad and a lot of the descriptions when effective are really good. I feel like an editor rushed through this because with a tighter edit it might have been a much better experience. I will still give Dead Silence a chance. Unfortunately, Ghost Station was not for me.