On the surface, Corinth Eaton's life is going according to plan. She is succeeding in her third year of medical school and in a serious relationship with a man she intends to marry. In reality, Corinth is barely afloat, struggling with debilitating anxiety and depression, as well as the recent death of her father. A split-second decision results in her suspension from surgery rotation and reassignment to Maxwood, the state psychiatric institution where her grandmother was a patient for decades. When Corinth discovers Granny's chart at Maxwood, she's desperate to make sense of the narrative in its pages--events her family refuses to discuss. The Granny she knows is docile and incoherent from years of medication and institutionalization, unable to provide her own account. But Corinth's rotation at Maxwood might just allow her to connect with her grandmother in ways she couldn't before. Blooming from the seeds of author Erin Miller Reid's family history, But for Fortune follows two women fifty years apart as they attempt to give voice to their own silenced realities.

What unfolds is a whirling intergenerational exploration of mental illness, discrimination, and the insidious nature of family secrets. Writing in lush prose and drawing on her own experiences as a doctor, Reid weaves together a story that is at once incisive, heartfelt, and deeply human.