But exactly what happened in all those political back rooms -- where the deals with campaign donors and the party bosses got done -- is left out or glossed over in his new memoir.

"Some things I'd done, or allowed to be done in my name, were morally repugnant to me," McGreevey writes in "The Confession," which is scheduled for release on Tuesday. "I did this by 'forgetting' or never allowing myself to know. I had my people strike back-room deals I kept myself in the dark about or forced from my mind if I learned too much. Obviously this is one root of my memory problems."

There is sex in his new book, but very little about the scandals that dogged his administration for most of his three years as governor. There is a full recounting of the now-infamous "gay American" speech, but very little of the spotty public legacy McGreevey left to New Jersey.

McGreevey talks about feeling "invincible" after closing a budget deficit shortly after taking office in 2002, even though a large portion of that deficit remains to this day.

He traces his evolution in the world of campaign finance from neophyte to reformer, while only obliquely describing and rationalizing the period when he was a master practitioner of fund-raising.

And the man often described as the ultimate micromanager, who as mayor would follow snowplows through Woodbridge to make sure they were clearing the streets, professes surprise and dismay when person after person in his administration and fund-raising circle came under investigation for corruption or worse crimes.

McGreevey raised political fund-raising to new heights, holding an event that raised $1 million while he was still Woodbridge mayor and making himself available as governor for private "sit-downs" with lobbyists whose clients put up enough cash. But in his book, McGreevey asserts that he tried to stay out of the back-room wheeling-dealing over patronage and contracts.

"I tried to stay as naﶥ about this horse trading as possible," McGreevey writes, then goes on for a page or so describing the intentions of big-ticket donors looking for appointments to boards such as the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

He talks glowingly at first about real estate magnate Charles Kushner's help to his campaigns, and blames politics for key legislators' criticism of Kushner's appointment to chair the Port Authority. Kushner resigned from the board before being elevated to the top post.

McGreevey does not write, for example, that at the same time he was having Kushner find a home and job for his purported lover, Golan Cipel, the developer had won the inside track on a lucrative state-backed redevelopment project in the Meadowlands. Nor does McGreevey tell his readers how Kushner eventually went to jail for illegally bundling together campaign contributions that went to McGreevey and the Democratic Party.

Although McGreevey says repeatedly that he never cared about money for himself, his book shows that he was obsessed with getting contributions that would aid his political career. He laments how he had only $300,000 early in the 1997 gubernatorial campaign while Republican Christie Whitman was raising millions. Then he writes about discovering Kushner and his "checkbook."

Within a few months, McGreevey brags, Kushner had arranged hundreds of thousands in contributions and, eventually, $1 million. Ultimately, Kushner, his family and various real estate companies pumped more than $1.5 million into the Democrat's coffers.

Another item that McGreevey largely ignores is the lengths to which he went to extract cash from lobbyists and other wealthy interests. As the 2005 reelection campaign approached, McGreevey and the Democrats had raised a staggering $20 million. One way they did it was by selling access to McGreevey, for a price.

Lobbyists who spoke to The Record said the Democratic State Committee was systematically calling State Street's most influential firms and offering private sessions with the governor. The cost for attendance at these soirees was $25,000 a head, and there was no shortage of takers.

McGreevey also brushes aside the time he was caught on a secret audiotape talking about Machiavelli to a Piscataway farmer trying to get a better price for his land from a government preservation program. Federal prosecutors said the reference to Machiavelli was a code word arranged by a fund-raiser to indicate a political fix was in, but McGreevey says the fund-raiser, David D'Amiano, set him up.

McGreevey refers to Asian-Indian fund-raiser Rajesh "Roger" Chugh as an old friend whose colorful and self-promoting personal Web site became an embarrassment. He also refers vaguely to news reports about Chugh's fund-raising techniques. But he does not give his readers any insight into the turmoil Chugh created in the Middlesex County Indian community.

A half-dozen leaders of the community, including the vice chairman of the Democratic State Committee, told McGreevey that Chugh was a con man who was strong-arming Indian-Americans for donations and promising illusory positions in the coming McGreevey adminstration.

"He later drew more disturbing allegations: members of his own community said that he'd strong-armed them into making political donations for my campaign, something I can't believe is true," McGreevey writes.

Key McGreevey campaign staffers told The Record that many of the contributions Chugh brought in had to be returned because they were obtained in violation of campaign finance laws. Although the campaign started an internal review of Chugh's practices, McGreevey and his staff declined to detail what that review found. There is no mention of this in the book, nor is there mention of an FBI investigation into Chugh just before he joined the McGreevey administration.

Chugh, documents revealed, had been forced to close a Manhattan travel agency he operated because he had defrauded Air India of more than $200,000. Just two days after The Record approached the administration in 2003 with details of bad checks Chugh had written in the Air India scam, Chugh was forced to resign.

Despite the notoriety of his sexual disclosures and the lingering questions about his public record, the book hints at a political second act for McGreevey.

In a section that describes the days leading up to his historic resignation and "gay American" speech on Aug. 12, 2004, McGreevey recalls being cheered up by a conversation with former House Majority Whip Tony Coelho, D-Calif., whom the governor knew through politics and his wife Dina's connections in the Portuguese community.

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