Did ‘The Pitt’s Mohan & Abbot Inspire Ali Hazelwood’s ‘Unbound’?
What To Know
- Fans have pointed out the similarities between Ali Hazelwood’s new audiobook romance and The Pitt‘s Mohan and Abbot.
- Hazelwood talked about being “obsessed” with The Pitt in a new interview.
- Unbound centers on the immortal Lilit and mortal ER doctor Roman.
Ali Hazelwood is no stranger to finding inspiration from pre-existing stories. In its first form, her 2021 novel The Love Hypothesis was famously fanfiction about Star Wars‘ Kylo Ren and Rey. Now, some readers have started speculating that The Pitt was Hazelwood’s muse for her latest audiobook romance, Unbound.
“Ali hazelwood being a mohabbot shipper was not on my 2026 bingo card but hey when life gives you lemons,” reads one viral X post, referring to the popular Dr. Abbot (Shawn Hatosy) and Mohan (Supriya Ganesh) ship amongst fans of the HBO medical drama. Others have pointed out the visual similarities between Mohan and Abbot and the couple on Unbound‘s cover.
In an interview with Harper’s Bazaar, Hazelwood confirmed that she was “obsessed” with The Pitt. “The other full-length novel that I finished also has a doctor character. So yes, I was one thousand percent watching The Pitt [while writing Unbound]. I don’t know why I do this to myself, because it gives me so much anxiety, but I really was obsessed with The Pitt for a while there. I have not watched season two yet. I am gonna be on the verge of a heart attack for an entire day as I binge the show.”
Unbound, which arrives on Spotify on July 14, is a sequel to Hazelwood’s Bound. The paranormal romance follows Lilit, a 5,000-year-old immortal who’s had a decade-long situationship with mortal ER doctor Roman. He doesn’t know what Lilit is, but when their lives are threatened, Lilit must confront her people’s politics and her complicated relationship.
Despite being the older one out of them both, Lilit looks younger than the 35-year-old Roman. (Mohan and Abbot, of course, are also an age-gap pairing.) “In the novella, I wanted to explore what it is like when the entire world underestimates you and thinks you are still very young and don’t have much life experience,” Hazelwood said. “Meanwhile, you have seen more than anyone else around you.”
Though she didn’t confirm if Lilit and Roman were spiritual counterparts to Mohabbot, the author said Roman was “a little bit” inspired by The Pitt in general. “I just wanted to write very competent physician heroes,” she explained. “Once you write one thing and you’ve done a little bit of research, it’s very easy to be like, I think I’m gonna use it for this next one; I was interested in exploring physicians for the three to four months I was writing this.”
