Reviewed by Kat
TITLE: Befriending the Bear
SERIES: Forestville Silver Foxes (Book 6)
AUTHOR: Nora Phoenix
PUBLISHER: Self Published
LENGTH: 265 pages
RELEASE DATE: August 8, 2025
BLURB:
Some fires you fight, some you let burn. With Calloway, all I want to do is feed the flames.
After thirty years as a firefighter and smokejumper, I’ve been forced into retirement by my injuries. Settling in Forestville was an easy decision, but what comes next? I have no clue who I am outside of my job.
When I meet Calloway, I recognize a kindred spirit. He’s hurting too, though for very different reasons. I wanna hug him, help him, hold him…and kiss the living daylights out of him because, god, he’s gorgeous.
But Calloway has created firebreaks around himself that are a bigger challenge than any burn I’ve ever faced. It’s gonna take time to convince him I’ll be a good friend…and an even better lover.
I’ve jumped out of planes into thousand-acre fires. Falling for Calloway? That’s the scariest thing I’ve ever done. And I’m doing it without a parachute.
Befriending the Bear is a slow-burn, friends-to-lovers MM romance between two older guys who find comfort with each other. This gay romance novel is the sixth book in the Forestville Silver Foxes series, a contemporary small town MM romance series featuring hot silver foxes and the men who fall in love with them. Each book can be read as a standalone.
REVIEW:
I have truly loved this series. Author Nora Phoenix doesn’t shy away from the really hard subjects and this one touched my heart.
Fraser Strickland is newer to town. He has relocated to Forestville, Washington after his latest injury. It was the one, after 30 years of being a firefighter and smokejumper, that left him unable to continue doing what he loved and forced him into retirement. When a chance meeting, after literally running into each other in the parking lot, he wants to get to know the gorgeous man that he recognizes is not only a poetry enthusiast but also hurting and is a kindred spirit. However , Calloway Gilstrap is extremely guarded and elusive. Calloway has been dealing with his husband’s sudden death for over seven years. The grief of the former NYC librarian not being home when Marcus suffered his pulmonary embolism has been crushing. Add in his severe stuttering, the result of a childhood accident that haunts his mother, and it’s just easier to retreat to his poetry books in his childhood hometown. But can the two men let down their walls and grasp something they thought was too late in their lives?
This book was extremely poignant and touching. The grief that consumed Calloway was heartbreaking. And his caution about meeting new people with his constant stutter was understandable. So, retreating into himself, his poetry and his gardening was totally understandable. And his mother’s help was suffocating. But her eventual confession made so much sense. The what if’s that loom after something so traumatic were also understandable. It’s just too bad it took 43 years for her confession for all of them.
I absolutely loved how tender and cautious Fraser was with Calloway. Earning Calloway’s trust was a monumental task. But a task that he was more than patient and considerate with. He recognized how special Calloway was when you were able to peel away the carefully built walls he had constructed to protect himself. But he needed someone as caring and special as Fraser to learn to trust again. I feared that trust would all collapse after Morrison’s offer. But I loved that it was the hermit Fraser had so much in common, Macallister that had bought the old Bear Creek Campground, that offered the solution I had wondered why Fraser hadn’t thought of. I am really hoping 🤞 that we get his story someday soon too.
This series has been very moving for me. You don’t have to read the previous books. There are characters that make appearances from them. But why would you ever want to miss out on something so wonderful. 🥰 This book really grabbed my heart. You can’t help but have hope in this slow burn novel that shows middle aged men overcoming their challenges to move forward with their new lives.
RATING: 
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