Heart's Song — Marcia Miller

After Dr. Seymour finished examining Louise Crane and found nothing wrong with her except her disposition, he told her daughter, Jill, that unless she, Jill, got out of the house and into a job, she would become as unhappy and complaining as her mother, who was still bitter over the accidental death of her husband some twelve years before.

Dr. Seymour suggested that Jill take a receptionist's job with a doctor friend of his; he even said that he would handle everything for her. Jill, always shy, had never asserted herself on any issue that might conflict with her mother, but now, for some reason, she promised Dr. Seymour that she would do as he told her. And despite Louise Crane's disparaging remark that her daughter would probably fail, Jill reported to work at the Baxter Medical Center as arranged.

It was a shock to Jill that things went so smoothly on her first day, and even more of a shock that Dr. Bob Carpenter, a russet-haired young man with an impish grin, had taken a fancy to her. For Jill, even with deep-set gray eyes and light brown hair, had always been a plain Jane type--which suited her mother. But Bob Carpenter admired Jill's "difference," as her put it--until Jill's lovely cousin, Veronica, came for a visit and turned things topsy-turvy.

How Jill overcomes her shyness and insecurity and learns that what a person is, is not necessarily what he appears to be, is the pivot around which this warm and insightful romance is woven.