The last word.

Gerald Boyd, the former New York Times managing editor who fell on his sword after the reporting scandal there, suggested in late August that he would write a memoir. His comments appeared in the August 20 New York Post, two weeks after Boyd broke his silence about his June 5 resignation along with the executive editor, Howell Raines. Boyd, claimed the Post, is shopping a memoir, but says he does not want to play up the plagiarism/news fabrication disclosures that sacked him and his boss.

"If I write a book, it will be about my fife and the world of journalism," Boyd told the tabloid. "It will not be a kiss-and-tell about the Jayson Blair scandal or settling scores."

Boyd was also quoted this way: "Marie [Brown, literary agent] has talked to a publisher about pursuing a book, but it's very preliminary at this point." Indeed. Reached for comment, Brown told Black Issues Book Review, "I am not representing Gerald Boyd as was stated in the New York Post. I don't want to comment."

The uptown agent also brushed off questions on whether she had any involvement in getting Boyd's project to a publisher: "I have no comment on that," says Brown, described as "a friend" of Boyd's in the Post account. Brown is a well-regarded veteran in the literary business whose agency, Marie Brown and Associates, has represented such African American authors as Audrey Edwards [1992], Leonard Pitts Jr. [1999] and Michael Cottman [2000].

Brown suggested that BIBR get the real story from Boyd. The former No. 2 on The Times's editorial staff, however, did not return repeated telephone calls.

During the week of August 25, the online bulletin blackjournalist.com posted a mock cover of Boyd. The headline was "Gerald Boy& In Black and White."

Other books are alleged to be in the works about the Blair-Times management meltdown. Blair, a 27-year-old reporter who had received promotions and increasing responsibilities, quit the paper after The Times found dozens of instances of plagiarism, deceit or no-shows in his work. Published reports only weeks later said Blair and an agent were shopping a memoir tentatively tided Burning Down My Master's House.

In September, Beverly Hills-based New Millennium Press announced it was publishing the Blair memoir, in March 2004, despite its filing for bankruptcy protection after losing a breach of contract lawsuit.

George Curry, editor of Black Press of America News Service, is editing an anthology tentatively titled Fit to Print? Jayson Blair, the New York Times and Twenty-First Century Journalism.

William McGowan, author of the 2001 antidiversity diatribe Coloring the News (Encounter Books, April 2003), was reputedly working on a book about the paper tentatively rifled Gray Lady Down, also by Encounter.

Rick Bragg, another former Times man and Pulitzer Prize winner and author, who resigned shortly after Blair when it was learned that he was overusing freelancers to do his out-of-town reporting, will focus his energy on writing The Jessica Lynch Story, a book due in November, according to published reports.

Raines, the former editor, has written hooks, but this time he will be the subject of a book by Seth Mnookin, a Newsweek correspondent, in a deal signed by Dan Menaker, editor-in-chief of Random House, according to Publishers Weekly.

The Times itself has its 14,000 word explainer that could be bound into a book. But The Times spokeswoman, Catherine Mathis, told BIBR: "We don't have any plans to do a book."

--Wayne Dawkins is the author of Black Journalists: The NABJ Story.