Space horror is the genre of my dreams (Alien is in my top 5 fave movies) and I’ve been itching for more (a pun I had to make- IYKYK) since I read her book Dead Silence. I’ve been anticipating this one since the cover reveal and was so excited to get an early copy! I gotta say- this book is really good and did not disappoint.

The year is 2199 and, spoiler alert, the world still sucks. Space exploration is common with many humans settling on other planets, moons, and space stations. Jobs in space are extremely common, too. Whether that’s R&E teams, mining communities, or exploration. Big corporations haven’t gone anywhere either. Enter Dr. Ophelia Brey. A psychologist trying to right past wrongs and prove to everyone and herself that she’s not like her family. Things go from bad to worse when she joins a space team and realizes she’s surrounded by secrets, her own included.

Barnes sure knows how to write an unsettling slow burn while also starting a story at the beginning of all the action. The first half of the book takes its time with some excellent world-building, character development, mystery, and just enough suspense to build some dread in the reader. The second half really ramps up as it becomes blindingly clear that things just aren’t right. I literally couldn’t put the last 30% down if I tried. I’m still trying to decide if I loved the ending or hated it. While I was reading it I couldn’t help but think ‘how cool!’ but now that I’m thinking about it, it felt a bit easy and unsatisfying. And so many of my questions went unanswered! BUT it did read like a movie, lending a very cinematic quality. I felt completely immersed in the story and could envision each scene vividly. Especially the horrific parts. So I can’t deny it was well written. Overall, highly recommend to any fan of sci-fi, space horror, slow burns, and isolated settings.

S.A. Barnes introduced me to the wonderful, terrifying world of space horror with her amaaaazing book, Dead Silence, so as soon as I found out she had a new book coming out, I stalked NetGalley for months waiting for Ghost Station to become available. The premise of GS is great: a small crew who recently lost a member under suspicious circumstances are sent by their corporate overlords to an abandoned space station on a remote planet to establish residency. Then the pilot is murdered and everyone starts unraveling.

Did I love this as much as Dead Silence? No... but there was just enough creepiness to keep me engaged so I was able to (mostly) overlook the things that didn't work for me (namely the main character who I never quite gelled with, weird pacing, some hazy, unsatisfying explanations, and a lot of unanswered questions). Which, when I type it all out makes it sound like I didn't like it -- but Barnes is an excellent writer with a dark imagination, so even though this wasn't my favorite book, I'd still recommend it to fans of Dead Silence, and am already excited to read whatever she writes next.

(3.5 rounded up)

I requested a digital copy in order to sample the prose on my phone (since I don't have a eReader) before requesting a physical copy for review. My review will be based on the physical ARC I read (if I qualify)

After a catastrophic event derails her career on Earth, psychologist Ophelia Bray gets herself assigned to an exploration ship whose crew is still mourning the loss of one of its members. Hoping to find redemption, Ophelia believes she can help them heal and avoid the possible affects of devastating syndrome that afflicts off planet miners and explorers. Her efforts are instantly met with hostility from the crew, which is more interested in investigating the planet to which their next mission has been assigned. Once they reach the abandoned station from a previous expedition, crew members begin experiencing strange dreams and hallucinations. And the strange remains of a previous civilization and unrelenting bad weather forebode something bad in the future. When the worst off one turns up dead, it becomes apparent the last inhabitants may have experienced something horrific that was purposely left out of reports.
This novel was a slow but steady burn, with a complexity to its central plot. There are numerous secrets unveiled little by little involving the planet, the exploration crew and, most of all, Ophelia. The story always seems to keep some of its cards hidden, revealing them only at key points in the plot, several of which are quite unexpected. It does require patience in reading, as the major happening don't really start to occur until after the midpoint of the novel. However, the narrative is interesting and builds slowly but steadily, so that patience is rewarded later on. My only contention with the tale was the fact that the third act, especially in the finale, felt drawn out longer than it should have been, which did start to strain my patience at bit towards the end. But overall, it was an excellent piece of space horror.

Another great hit from S.A. Barnes! Sci-fi isn't always my favorite genre but this and Dead Silence were fantastic. Really enjoyed trying to figure out what was happening the whole time and seeing who was next 👀

The premise of the book starts off really well. Going to an alien planet and finding things that should not be.
Exploring the planet and discovering aliens....but the explorers bring back something more back to their hub.

The psychologist believes that a recent space worker went crazy and just walked off into a desolate planet to commit suicide. She is brought into the mission to hedge all bets against mental illness.
yet she is harboring her own doubts.

The book is wooden, the characters are not likable, things that were mentioned that could be scary....are never explained nor explored.

They find an alien species in a heap. They don't explore. There is nothing further about it. Just found some aliens, ok. Just another day.

Then the ending...everyone wakes up. Everyone is good. THE END!
What the heck happened?

This was not worth my time.

This book was hard to fathom why it was labelled as a horror story.

Further, this genre has been done before, its called ALIEN!

Ghost Stations, the sci-fi horror follow-up from S.A. Barnes, is once again an excellent read. I really liked Dead Silence, and was looking forward to reading this. It was a slowburn start in my opinion, I expected more action. But I do think that the slowness of the plotting really help create an unnerving, and claustrophobic feeling. The reader primarily follows Ophelia, a doctor on her first long term away mission. She is travelling with a crew who recently lost a member while she herself is working through a former patient trauma. I really like the characters, I wish I'd had more time with them. I recommend this book to fans of the original Alien film as the pacing especially at the beginning is similar. I will be continuing to watch for more from Barnes in the future.

My face the entire time I read this book : 0. So suspenseful, so creepy, and totally worth reading! I'm new the sci-fi genre, and I think this one fits in quite nicely. I would love to read more about Ophelia and her past, so we'll see what comes next!

This story is really good. I really like Barnes’s voice. I prefer my space horror to be eerie and atmospheric and this story definitely delivered.

My thanks to S.A. Barnes and Tor Nightfire for providing this advanced review copy.

This would have been great to read around Halloween but I was a little late. But it's a great spooky sci-fi read and would honestly make such a good movie. Ophelia is a complex character that I was rooting for the whole time. The setting is perfectly done and creates suspense just based on where they are. Everything built up slowly then everything happened at once--which was the perfect blend. My only issue was that the end wrapped up soooo fast. I wish there had been a longer epilogue instead of just a few paragraphs essentially telling what happened.

Top tier sci-fi horror from one of the best in the genre.

This book has everything I want in a sci-fi horror. We have aliens. We have a crew with secrets. We have an unknown planet with constant storms. Yes. Yes and Yes. If you're looking for a story that puts you right in the action, this is it. If you enjoyed S.A Barnes' previous standalone book, "Dead Silence" you will will love reading this.

Our main character, psychologist Dr. Ophelia Bray, is sent on her first ship to study and hopefully mitigate the effects of 'ERS' (a sort of space PTSD) for crews on long missions away from Earth. Dr. Bray has a secret, and one of the crew knows it. The team is sent to a planet to claim habitation rights on behalf of their employer (a huge corporation), but arrive to see the hab unit they'll be living in dark, like everyone who was previously there left in a hurry. When our first crew member shows up dead in a horrific way, the crew races to understand what's happening before someone is next. What is real, what is trauma, where do both intersect?

S.A Barnes does an amazing job keeping you guessing the whole way through. The creeping feeling of dread starts at a rolling boil and does not let up the entire time. The pacing is great. The characters are really compelling and the ending (no spoilers) is satisfying.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for this advanced reader copy. I will be recommending this read to everyone from now until it's release date, April 2024 and beyond.

This book is best read while isolated on a dead planet, trapped with strangers, by storms. All the more opportunity to read without interruption.

Thank you to Tor Publishing Group, Tor Nightfire, and NetGalley for allowing me to read an early version of this book! The book was a Read Now, so I well. read now.

I thought the book started out promising-- trauma that can cause you to kill (but with possible... iffyness about mental health) but through the eyes of a psychologist who is unlikely to stigmatize, one haunted by her own traumas and her own very shaky relationships with her family, where capitalism continues to be the villain. Later on, I'd also liked the horror background-- the bones, the unburied, the interest it had, because who killed them? What killed them?

However that was where it. .. ended for me, really. It seemed easy enough to read, but . I very well might have missed some descriptions and implications, but there seemed to be about four explicit characters of color. One is the (presumably) Black best friend, who is there for a scene to "betray" the protag. He is considered a few times after his scene ends. Next is a very antagonistic shipmate, who is the first living character to die on-page, explicitly stated as having dark skin. Third is a presumably Hawai'ian (in heritage, going off words used) woman, who is the second person to die on-page. The last character is a South Asian man, who is also introduced as having "anything from an obnoxious sense of humor to right-up-to-the-line sexual harassment", but mostly it means he's a jerk to the protag, until she's in a major incident and she helps him.

As I say, I very well might have missed others. The two men mentioned above are not the only antagonistic shipmates, the woman there is the first friendly face to her onboard the ship. The protag is not well-liked due to her billionaire family, the recent loss of a crewmate, and the fact she effectively forced her way on. The obviously-love interest is clear from the intro portion and the first introduction.

It also made use of one of my least favorite tropes-- jealous means you are right! The first and only character the protag is jealous of turns out to the Other Major Antagonist (other than who is killing them off) and her distrust is validated later. I'm not sure what I think about this, but my hopes were certainly higher.

My thanks to Tor Publishing, S.A. Barnes and Netgalley.
So. This story really sucked the lifeblood outta me! It took me 5 or 6 days to read, which is way too long. Also, it was slightly juvenile in the way the author depicted the main character. She just meets the boss and he's kind of a jackass to her, yet she gets flustered? I mean really?
Moving on.
The story in itself is all kinds of lame and blah.
For shits sake! All the scares are in the title of this book. Ghost Station! Ooh, ahh! Yea, not so much.
I'm not sure how some asshat managed to make this shit bland, but Barnes somehow managed. Hey, kudos to you! Now fuck off and take your lame ass storytelling elsewhere.
Sheesh, you almost managed to kill "horror" for me.
This is not horror, it's lame.

This was solid science fiction horror novel. I am finding that I like these more and more and am always excited to dig into a new one. S.A. Barnes has a distinct writing style and you could clearly tell this came from their mind. However, I thought the story got a little muddled during the end and wrapped up rather quickly. Slightly unsatisfying but acceptable.

I really enjoyed this one! S.A. Barnes writes great sci-fi and horror, and I've been a fan of hers since the early 2010s when she was writing the YA "Project Paper Doll" series. I liked the character depth a lot in this one; I felt that all of the characters were more fully fleshed out than in her previous horror novel, Dead Silence (although I enjoyed that one as well). Ophelia was a really great main character, and I loved how her backstory was slowly revealed throughout the main plot of the story. I was definitely creeped out for most of the book, but I wasn't expecting to enjoy the characters as much as I did!

I enjoyed Barnes other book enough to try this one, but I struggled to finish. The plot was weak and the characters were unfinished and hard to relate to. I never quite got the why any of them were existing and for what purpose. The ending seemed a bit rushed like the author also wanted to hurry up and finish the book. I doubt I will venture into their next effort. That said every book has its reader and those who like horror lite will enjoy this as an airplane read and forget novel, hence the 3 stars.

If you are ever asked to go to a snowy remote planet to investigate a death and psychologically evaluate the crew ... say no! In this horror/science fiction/thriller, everyone in the crew seems to be hiding something and nothing is quite what it seems.

I enjoyed this book once the pace picked up. The action doesn't really start until you are about 50% of the way in the book. If you like stories set in cold places where you aren't sure who to trust (The Thing) then you will probably like this book.

Thank you to NetGalley for a digital ARC of this book in return for my honest opinion.

Another great space horror from S.A. Barnes! A reader can almost feel themselves in a spacesuit. I am hoping we might see more of Ophelia in another book.

In Ghost Station we enter into a new galaxy that Barnes has effortlessly created. We meet Dr. Bray, our heroine, she is doing her best to right the wrongs of her billionaire family. As her specialty is treating a sort of PTSD that those traveling in space are susceptible too, she has been assigned to a small ship following the death of one of their members.

As the ship draws close to a new planet, Dr. Bray realizes that there the crew is keeping secrets from her. She does her best to build trust but it's not long before the death of another crew member brings tragedy and chaos to the ship. Can Ophelia help the crew and banish her own demons?

What a ride! I love a good space adventure and this was absolutely perfection!
#GhostStation #SABarnes #tor

I think S.A Barnes is slowly turning me into a SciFi Girlie.

We are back in the world S.A Barnes created. The future of the galaxy. Ophelia is a psychiatrist who has had a rocky past and now she’s heading out to a new planet with a team she has never worked with.

Even though this is the same world as the first book. We don’t get any mention of the first book so they definitely not a series and read as stand-alones.

I am absolutely in love with this world that S.A Barnes creates. I can picture every scene in this book. Being able to picture everything with all the detail makes the book much scarier. I am completely enthralled during the whole book while being on the edge of my seat.

This is a great SciFi Thriller. It really makes you rethink if we should be exploring outside our galaxy.

If you love:
🔺SciFi
🔺Alien Infection
🔺Outer Space Exploration
🔺Strong Female Lead

Genre: SciFi Horror
APK: Ebook
Pages: 394
Rating: 4.5⭐️
Series or Standalone: Stand-alone.