Reviewed by Anna Lynn

TITLE:  Stripped

SERIES:  Four Bears Construction #6

AUTHOR:  K.M. Neuhold

PUBLISHER:  Self-Published

LENGTH:  171 Pages

RELEASE DATE:  July 2, 2021

BLURB:

A ripped, transgender construction worker and a tweed-wearing, tortoise-shell-cozy-knitting, bear of a professor… Somebody’s getting stripped.

The last place I expected to run into my childhood camp crush was at the local university, looking all kinds of cute in a tweed jacket with a nervous blush. I’ve always had a bit of a thing for the nerdy professor type.

Demetri says he doesn’t date. I want to believe that it’s true and not that he’s not interested in a transgender man like me. If all he can offer me is friendship, I’m more than happy to take it.

Coy looks during sweaty workouts, rainy nights on his couch watching him knit shell cozies for his pet tortoise… I’m falling for him whether I want to or not.

Can I break down his walls and prove to him that he can trust me with his heart? And can I trust him with mine?

REVIEW:

Four Bears Construction is about four best friends (Cole, Ollie, Stone and Everett) who decided to put up their own construction business.  It has become very successful. I really thought the series ended with all four best friends finding their happily-ever-after, but I was very pleasantly surprised that there are more books coming. We have had book 5, Stud, which was about West (Dare’s nephew who lived with his uncle while Stone and Dare were navigating their own relationship) and Sawyer, owner of Wooley’s, the bar which the four bears have always frequented.

Stripped is the story of  Miller, one of our additional mainstays in the Four Bears Construction. He is a Transgender. He is happy with who he is but he knows that not everyone is able to handle that so he has not been in any kind of relationships for quite some time. He sees his bosses with their respective partners, and he can see how happy they all are. He is still positively hopeful that he will be able to find his own happiness one day. But there are also times when he thinks he will not be able to find someone who will totally accept him for who he is. Seeing his childhood crush again has thrown him for a loop because Demetri exactly fits the one he is looking for.

Demetri makes it his duty to wake up early in order to oogle the sexy man who jogs by his house every morning. He never expected that man to be someone from his past. Someone he went to camp with one summer. He knew that that boy had a crush on him back then. So when Miller sought him out specifically after seeing him in the university when their construction company has a contract, they reconnected. But he has some baggage that makes him doubt those who show interest in him. He has been burned, not once, but several times.

Demetri thinks Miller is not really interested in him. He thinks how can Miller be interested when he is slightly rounded, looks older, stressed (although they are the same age) and boring, while Miller is every man’s ultimate dream, sexy, ripped and all-around skilled and talented with his hands. But Miller is the real thing, he finds Demetri sexy and very interesting, tortoise and all. He just needs to show Demetri that he believes that and will be there for the long haul.

A sweet tale of love between two people who used to be friends. A reconnecting of two adults who have hang ups, learning to navigate a new relationship, and learning that not every man seeks out to destroy your confidence and demeans who you are, that there are still people who are honest and will accept you for who you truly are.

RATING:

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