Why Didn't I Think of This Before?!

Cohn and Brett are actually really similar! At first, it seemed as though Brett and Cohn weren't very similar at all. Brett liked to party with whomever she pleased, and Cohn was "whipped" and following Frances around like a duckling follows its mother. They really are alike, though! Okay, so both of them had failed marriages. Robert Cohn's wife left him "just as he had made up his mind to leave his wife" (p. 12), and on page 207, we learn that Brett's ex-husband "used to tell her he'd kill her." So that explains part of their messed-up-ness. Additionally, (check out that transition! it's pretty, right?) they've found new significant others with whom they appear to be happy. But at the beginning of the novel, Cohn and Frances fall apart, and towards the end, Brett and Mike begin to fall apart. While they come from similar pasts, they both act very different, but they still have serious issues when it comes to relationships.