NAMES IN THE NEWS : Author, Wife Finalize Divorce

Author Jay McInerney and his wife have settled their divorce, averting a court date that promised a roster of celebrities as possible witnesses, an attorney says.

McInerney, 35, whose book “Bright Lights, Big City” was made into a film, and Merry McInerney, a University of Michigan graduate student, declined to disclose terms of the agreement.

Kenneth Prather, McInerney’s lawyer, said the divorce became final Monday.

Merry McInerney, 30, claimed in the divorce papers she had taken jobs to support the couple while McInerney was a budding writer and that she helped him write parts of his first book.

The list of possible witnesses in the case had included Michael J. Fox, who starred in “Bright Lights, Big City,” and authors Norman Mailer, Bret Easton Ellis and Tama Janowitz.

The McInerneys married in 1984.