Imperfect Women season 2 renewed with Kerry Washington, and book readers are in the dark too: there's no sequel to adapt

Imperfect Women is no longer a limited series. Apple TV has renewed the thriller for a second season, Variety first reported in early October 2026, with Kerry Washington returning as Eleanor. The renewal came about five months after season 1 wrapped.

Season 1 premiered on March 18, 2026, with eight episodes adapted from Araminta Hall's 2020 novel. Eleanor (Washington) and Mary (Elisabeth Moss) tried to work out who murdered the third member of their friend group, Nancy (Kate Mara), seen in flashbacks. Season 2 drops the trio format and builds the whole thing around Eleanor.

"I'm so excited to step back into Eleanor's shoes."

— Kerry Washington

There is no book 2

Hall wrote one Imperfect Women novel, and there's no second book to adapt. So if you read the novel to get ahead of the show, congratulations: you now know exactly as much about season 2 as everyone who didn't.

What season 2 does have is a logline. Eleanor returns to her hometown roots in the affluent Black enclave of Martha's Vineyard, and finds secrets and scandals under its idyllic surface that threaten to upend everything she thought she knew about her past.

What we know about season 2

• The lead: Washington, who also executive produces through her Simpson Street banner with Pilar Savone.
• The showrunners: series creator Annie Weisman, who ran season 1, plus Justin Hillian (The Chi, Snowfall), who joins as co-showrunner. They're credited as creators of season 2.
• Still involved: Moss and Lindsey McManus executive produce through Love & Squalor Pictures, and Hall herself is an executive producer.
• The studios: 20th Television and Apple Studios.
• Not announced: a premiere window or the rest of the cast.

Apple's head of programming, Matt Cherniss, framed the renewal as a chance to expand the world through what he called "Kerry's fan favorite character of Eleanor."

There's an obvious precedent for the book-runs-out problem. HBO renewed Big Little Lies, also pitched as a limited series, after it adapted all of Liane Moriarty's novel, and Moriarty wrote new material for the second season to work from. Here, the plan is an original story from the writers' room, with the author along as a producer.