is back. The Hulu series based on the book of the same name premiered its second season on Wednesday September 4, with new episodes dropping weekly thereafter. If you’re new to the world of Tell Me Lies, here are the basics: The story centers on protagonist Lucy Albright’s (Grace Van Patten) toxic yet addicting relationship with Stephen DeMarco (Jackson James White), whom she meets during the first weeks of her freshman year at the fictional Baird College.
Though Lucy is initially unimpressed by him, they soon get caught up in a years-long on-again, off-again romance, with each of them cheating on other partners at various points along the way. The plot of the Carola Lovering novel focuses entirely on Lucy and Stephen, whereas the show expands the roles and storylines of several supporting characters from the book, chiefly the main duo’s college besties: Pippa (Sonia Mena) and Bree (Catherine Missal) on Lucy’s side, Wrigley (Spencer House) and Evan (Branden Cook) on Stephen’s. Both the book and the show jump between timelines, cutting from Bree and Evan’s nuptials in the present day to the crew’s time at Baird almost a decade earlier.
As returning viewers may recall, the first season of the show covered about a third of the events in the book, with the finale taking place at the luau-themed party where Stephen ditches Lucy to get back with his ex-girlfriend, Diana (Alicia Crowder)—which means the original novel still has plenty of plot fodder left for this sea.