A perfect scare to swallow up in one sitting. Filled with blood galore while holding tender humanity at its center, this is my favorite type of horror.” — Chloe Gong, #1 New York Times bestselling author of These Violent Delights Are you afraid of generation ships? And outer space? And dying airless, stranded in nothing? Then keep your eyes out for The Scourge Between Stars , which crosses The Expanse with Pandorum by way of Event Horizon and emerges darkly victorious.”— Gemma Files The Scourge Between Stars is a SF-Horror novella from Ness Brown. I had the opportunity to listen to the audiobook, which is performed by my favorite narrator, Bahni Turpin. Ness Brown’s The Scourge Between Stars, a tense, claustrophobic sci-fi/horror blend in the vein of Alien and Event Horizon, will be published by Nightfire in April 2023!

I received this book for free from the Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review. The Scourge Between Stars by Ness BrownThe World Building is minimal in the story. While much world building is usually based on the physical world, this world building focused on the history of the ship and mankind in general. This sets the stage for a grim mood that helped play to the story’s horror theme. All-in-all the story is definitely a character driven story with well enough build world that can be found believable for the reader. Claustrophobia. Mysterious monster. Banging in the walls. The call is coming from inside the house and we are not alone in here. It’s a nonstop ride and does not let up on its heroine or the crew. Trust me, if you think you know where this story is going, you're wrong. Combines the sudden, heart-rending fear of immediate danger with the freezing spun-out dread of being lost in infinite space. Just wonderful.” — David Wellington, author of The Last Astronaut While I enjoyed the characters and the setup of The Scourge Between Stars, the horror elements were not developed well enough to leave a lasting impression. The novel would have benefitted from being more thoroughly fleshed out, with emphasis on providing greater deviation from the familiar plot points of Alien.

This novella has everything I want in a sci-fi horror: lots of action, excellent character arcs, and a solid resolution.”— Buzzfeed This novella has everything I want in a sci-fi horror: lots of action, excellent character arcs, and a solid resolution.” — Buzzfeed If you enjoy sci-fi sprinkled with a light bit of creepiness, The Scourge Between Stars by Ness Brown might be the book for you, but as someone who was initially drawn to its horror-in-space premise, I confess I was left feeling disappointed. The novella format was also perhaps not the most ideal for the author’s vision of the story, which recycled far too many genre tropes making the plot feel unoriginal and predictable. There's some word choices that feel a little off, one of those first-book, pre-hard-editing kinds of things (' stared at a horrible noise,' and my personal peeve, an inappropriate 'smirked'). Hopefully, that will improve in the final edition, but I'll note that it seemed better than the average first-book.Generation ships have been a popular science fiction trope for a long time, but would you really want to live on one? To spend your entire life in the confines of a single vessel, never knowing anyone outside your crew? Never knowing if your descendants will make it to your ultimate destination, let alone establish a successful and thriving colony? I will definitely recommend this novella to my friends, and I can't wait to see what else Ness Brown has in store for the future. The static buzzed in her ear again, but this time it fizzled into clarity. The last fragment of the message came out loud and clear. Tense, gory, and genuinely creepy…. Brown handles the astronomy and exobiology equally as competently as the interpersonal dynamics and trauma. The result is a sci-fi horror mash-up that holds its own with the classics of the genre.”— Publishers Weekly Normally I do a plot summary to remind myself of the story, but this one can really be summed up by the description "monster on a sinking ship". There's lots of scary broken-down ship chase and jump scare horror, also the horror of someone you know betraying you. That, plus a very realistic description of the quotidian problems of an aged generation ship and a diverse cast round out the strengths.