The Village Voice removed the cover story of this week’s issue from its Web site and suspended the author after learning the article contained fabricated material.

The article, “Do You Wanna Kiss Me?” by Nick Sylvester, is a humorous but allegedly factual look at the impact of the popular book, “The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists” by Neil Strauss, on the New York singles scene. Sylvester is a senior associate editor of the Voice.

The concluding section of the article, which includes a conversation among three Los Angeles television writers testing the book’s techniques at a Lower East Side bar, is fabricated, according to the Voice. In a telephone interview with The New York Sun last night, the Voice’s acting editor-in-chief, Doug Simmons, said he was still reviewing the article for additional factual errors.

“I hope that this isn’t any worse than it already is. He is a very young and talented writer and I hope he gets a second chance,” Mr. Simmons said.

The editor indicated that the paper’s decision to pull Sylvester’s story from the Web site, rather than attaching an editor’s note, was still being debated in the newsroom. “Once we knew there was a fabrication – and we didn’t know the extent of it – we pulled it down,” Mr. Simmons said. “I’m still not sure whether that was the way to go and that is still a debate in the office.”

“It’s still a fresh wound,” he said.

In a statement on the newspaper’s Web site, Mr. Sylvester writes, “Dear Voice Readers: I did not meet Steve Lookner in New York at Bar 151. The trip and my encounter with him, DC, and Vali did not happen as I reported, or at all. The scene was a composite of specific anecdotes shared to me primarily by the two other parties, DC and Vali; Lookner did not share or take part in these anecdotes either. I deeply regret this misinformation, and I apologize to Lookner for his distress, which I certainly never intended. Sincerely, Nick Sylvester.”