Title: Ghost Station by S.A. Barnes
Publication Date- 04/09/24
Publisher- MacMillan
Overall Rating- 3 out of 5 stars

Review: Review copy given to me by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I always promise to give everyone and honest review. It is with a sad and heavy heart that I have to report I DNF’d this book at 55 percent in. I still gave it a 3 star overall review to be fair to the author. I do think many of you will enjoy the book especially if you enjoyed her previous work Dead Silence. What I’ve come to learn is that S.A. Barnes can get my attention, get me roped in but can’t hold me through the story. I wish there would have been more horror elements, the sci-fi was solid and one of the enjoyable parts of the story. Her world building is unique and makes sense. That is a strong suit to her works. Often when I read sci-fi I am confused and easily and therefore frustrated. That was not the case here, I really enjoyed those aspects.

Personally, I struggled with how the story was being told and what attention to detail was being put where. I found the pieces of the story that are meant to build tension, create interesting characters and add to the plot to be lackluster. I will own that I think a lot of this comes down to personal preference which is why I couldn’t rate it less than three stars.

I don’t think I will be alone in feeling this way. Dead Silence, I gave 3 stars but had some of the same feelings. Sadly, I think this lacks in comparison. Like I said, I really enjoy her horror elements and wish there would have been more of that. She builds tension well and is able to put the reader on edge. We got into some of that at the 55 percent mark but it wasn’t enough to keep me invested.
Lastly, I felt that the story was very slow paced. Which is fine, but I would like the slower moving parts to build tension and/or help me get to know the characters and I just didn’t feel that way.

This might sound confusing but I will try this author again. There is enough there that I do enjoy and I’m interested to see how she develops as an author and where her stories go.

One of my most anticipated books because I loved Dead Silence and it lived up to expectations!

Therapist Ophelia joins a mission to another planet after the crew suffers the loss of one of their teammates. She's supposed to be there for moral support but ends up doing WORK after the members of the team start acting strangely, Of course, there's a question in her mind as to whether things truly are strange or if she's projecting concerns because of a secret she's tried to run from her whole life.
I loved this book although the ending was a considerable amount more open than Dead Silence. The other issue I had with this book was the heavy amount of abbreviations used, as I believe they could have been named something else for the sake of the story (for example, writing out medical unit instead of PMU which I'm guessing stands for personal medical unit now, but it took me a long time to remember what it was supposed to be when someone referenced it in the story).

Original, creepy and creative.
I loved the concept - a therapist from a wealthy family has a dark past. Providing therapy for those returning from deep space missions, Ophelia's reputation takes a hit with the suicide of a patient. Determined to prove her worth, Ophelia agrees to travel with a crew - a crew experiencing the loss of a member, potentially a victim of ERS, a contagious mental health breakdown.
The crew obviously are unwelcoming - yet Ophelia does her best to push through. The crew begins to show signs of instability - and a suspicious rash. Is it ERS?
I like this book - though it could have been cut back by at least 50 pages.

4⭐️

S.A.Barnes has solidified themselves as a go to author for me. This definitely a slow burn space horror while diving deep in a character study and deep topics, I absolutely loved it.

Similar to Dead Silence the characters are flawed and not necessarily loveable. They come off as real people with authentic flaws. I really appreciated this take on these characters. In this book we are dealing with large amount of grief and bottling up of emotions, or avoidance/blame. I really appreciated this a lot. It gave depth to this book than just the horror in space.

SA Barnes also writes romance books under a different name and part of the reasons I love these books as much as I do is she creates this romantic tension even in these horror books. However it doesn't take over the story line, it's just there simmering. I need more of this and I hope it continues in her future books.

Similar to Dead Silence this book was easier to digest in an audio format for me personally. With this being a slower paced book, I struggled reading this physically while retaining what I read. There is just a lot of information being shared.

I would recommend this any readers who enjoy psychological horror/suspense, slow burn sci-fi horror, strong character depiction, and the hint of romance mixed in.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing for this advanced reader copy. My review is voluntarily my own.

Summary:

Dr. Ophelia Bray is a psychologist with a past. So maybe her decision to go into space and study ERS (a deadly space-based mental condition) is more than a little bit self-serving. But then again, who hasn't wanted to run from their problems?

Unfortunately, it doesn't take long for Ophelia and the crew to realize there is something very, very wrong on this abandoned planet. It's almost as if there's a reason the previous attempts to understand it have failed...

Review:

She does it again! I fell in love with S.A. Barnes' writing style when Dead Silence was first released, and Ghost Station did not disappoint. If you love claustrophobic sci-fi horrors, this is the perfect read.

Ghost Station delves into the horrors of our past while playing with the psychological implications of isolation and space travel. This feels far too human and real on many levels, giving a solid foundation for the more sci-fi elements to take hold.

There are layers of mysteries hidden within Ghost Station. It is a true psychological horror; each character comes aboard with their own baggage. Meanwhile, the atmosphere alone will give readers the chills. This is the sort of novel I'd love to see make it to the big screen.

Highlights:
Sci-Fi Horror
Space Horror
Claustrophobic & Body Horror
Aliens & Other Horrors

I was entertained by this as a way to pass time, but honestly, the pacing was bizarre and the main character seemed dedicated to making the least reasonable decision possible at every turn. Fine but not memorable

I received an arc of Ghost Station from Macmillan Audio. Thank you for the free book Macmillan.

Ghost Station was a very anticipated read for me after reading Dead Silence last year. This book did not disappoint me. The novel was a little slow to pick up due to the early world building and character development, but once it picked up, it was absolutely nonstop thrills. With a haunting pros and a claustrophobic feel you definitely feel very stressed and filled with tension over the situation that the characters find themselves in. There are some really great tropes in the novel and some of the ones I enjoyed were: isolation horror, claustrophobia, body gore, and white out blizzard. Not to mention the obvious sci-fi theme set on a distant planet.


Overall, I really enjoyed this book but I do wish the start had been a little bit quicker paced. I'll definitely be reading more by this author.

The best part of this book is the build up. Once we know what's going on it is a bit less exciting. I enjoyed the pace of the story as it kept me intrigued and reading quickly. I did enjoy our main character and she goes through a good amount of character growth, but some of the side characters are weaker. I wish we could have spent more time with them. Also, as someone who is a psychiatrist, it was nice to read a book with a psychiatrist/psychologist as the main character that didn't completely piss me off. Overall I think this is a good genre-blend of sci-fi, thriller, and horror.

Oof, this one hurts. I was highly anticipating another scary spacey read, particularly from this author after having enjoyed DEAD SILENCE so much, but this.. wasn’t horror. It leaned more towards a mystery but even that doesn’t really work because there’s never a thing to truly solve — and we certainly don’t get answers. So, what was this? It was a trip to space as one woman, isolated not only from humanity and her home planet as well as more or less cast off from her family of mostly horrible people, but also in the sense that the people she’s on said trip with don’t want her there, works through her trauma and comes to terms with finally believing that she isn’t the sum total of her parents’ faults.

And that’s kinda it.

Okay fine, at a certain point GHOST STATION plays at being spooky — though maybe uncomfortable is really as far as things go — because there is some weirdness but truly this isn’t horror, there were none thrills or chills (though your mileage may vary based on your overall tolerance), and so I’m disappointed both by the overall somewhat lacklustre experience but also that I didn’t get what the marketing promised me.

I hope this is just a sophomore slump situation and there’s still some spacey scares to come from this author but unfortunately this was a letdown.

Someone needs to rewrite the blurb, because it gives away a major plot point that doesn’t happen until over halfway through the book! It really affected how I read it, and that spoiler is totally unnecessary.

That said, I really enjoyed this book! I love a space horror and there’s not enough of them, so I’m hoping S. A. Barnes keeps giving us more. This one gives major Prometheus vibes and I love that.

Ophelia is a psychologist studying people who have experienced a psychotic break while working in deep space. She is sent on a mission to counsel the surviving members of an expedition after they lose a member of their team, but things get complicated as they explore an ancient abandoned planet and Ophelia’s past traumas come back to haunt her.

This story is full of haunted pasts, family guilt, evil corporations who control space exploration, and some very creepy alien architecture.

Thank you so much to Raincoast Books for the advanced copy.

Like Dead Silence, S.A Barnes does it again. This was such an unsettling read. I loved the characters and was invested in their story and their outcomes. I really enjoyed how the plot had a little something to do with our main characters past. I also loved the alien aspect, incredibly creepy and well done.

This was an awesomely creepy story with loads of “what lurks in the shadows” vibes. It did start off slow but I think that actually set up the anticipation for the jump scares and those moments that had my skin crawling. I’m normally not put on edge by a book but this had me sleeping with the hallway light on. Definitely an awesome read.

Follow the story of a psychologist as she embarks on an expedition to establish a home on an abandoned planet. Her crew mates like to play pranks but then strange things begin to happen. This book had me guessing.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. The tagline had me at space horror and that was all I needed to be captivated. A very overlooked, yet niche genre/location. I'm terrified of space, but not enough seem to share that fear, and rarely write about it. This had me drawn to every page, I couldn't stop reading.

3.5 ⭐
There were some passages that I felt could have been edited better, so maybe that will reflect on the final publication, but overall an enjoyable space horror! I wish it had gotten more intense sooner, but the build up wasn't bad.
I enjoyed Dead Silence a lot and will continue reading books by Barnes!

Ghost Station was the first book that I read by S.A. Barnes. I don't often read space exploration horror books however, this one was said to be for fans of Alien so, I figured "what the hell?"

Barnes can weave a good story with great character development and, can also make you feel like you are actually there in the book watching what is happening in person.

Unfortunately however, the story moved a bit too slow for my liking taking too long to get to the punch of the novel. I get that in a psychologically driven story, this is important to set tone and mood however, I felt that for this book, it didn't really hit that way.

Though this book wasn't for me, if you are a fan of sci fi horror and space exploration, then this one could be for you! Just be ready for a slow moving journey that eventually comes to an ending you might feel satisfying!

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the opportunity to read Ghost Station.

I absolutely loved Dead Silence. I was super excited to get to read Ghost Station. However, this one didn’t keep my attention the same way. There seemed to be extra parts to the story that weren’t necessary. I get that Ophelia’s background was part of the build up/ story telling but I found that I just wasn’t as interested in that. I wanted to know more about what was happening to the crews. Show me the madness that comes with ERS. The story seemed to drag through the middle. The fighting between the crew and the doctor didn’t really add to feeling isolated. It just felt like squabbling. I want to say I see the aspects of the story, but they just didn’t do what they were intended (for me at least). However, I also cannot say how to do better. Just saying how it felt as a reader.

I am still going to read more from SA Barnes as long as she continues to write sci fi / horror. This just wasn’t my favorite.

This is the first book by this author I've read, and although it's a slow starter, it turned out to be a good science fiction story about planet exploration and the perils it involves.

Ophelia Bray is a psychotherapist assigned to a Reclamation and Exploration Team to map and explore a planet whose salvageable rights have just been acquired. Her goal is to detect the early warning signs of Eckhart-Reiser syndrome (ERS), a condition that, if it is not caught early, can cause psychotic breaks, violence, and insanity. Along with her own emotional baggage, the team she joins has just suffered the traumatic loss of a crewmember and resents Ophelia's inclusion on this mission. She must overcome her own demons and try to win over the crew if she will be of help.

Once on the planet, crewmembers begin displaying unusual behavioral systems that may or may not be associated with ERS. It's up to Ophelia to figure out what is happening before she, too, is affected.

The book's first third is a slog as Ophelia seems to psychoanalyze every situation and individual, including herself. However, the pace picks up once the action starts on the planet, and this turns into an exciting action-adventure read. It is an atmospheric story with a touch of horror thrown in to keep things interesting. Overall, I enjoyed this book. 4/5 stars.

Thank you, NetGalley and Tor Nightfire, for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. The publication date is April 9, 2024.

This was a two star book for me up until the 80% mark. The horror really delivered at the end of the story (which is why it’s 3 stars instead of 2), but it just took too long to get there. I didn’t enjoy the pacing and I felt that the book could have been shortened and had the same impact. The author also unnecessarily talked about pee twice in chapter three and it was just weird in my opinion. Some of the things that I did like were the atmospheric setting and the creativity with the truth behind what was really going on on the planet.

I love that the sci-fi/horror genre has really taken off in the past year or so, and I thought this was a great entry into the canon. I read these to see if my husband will like it, and to keep my literary mind open with all kinds of genres I wouldn't normally pick up, and I enjoyed this one more than most actually! Well written and paced just right, this was a thrill of a story that allowed me to suspend my disbelief for a while.