The last few days have seen a quickening increase in stories reflecting a rapidly and drastically worsening situation for the American book industry, combined with stories of some working hard to innovate their way out of it, and interspersed with possible instances of a more naked opportunism that seems unique to American capitalism. In short it’s become clearer and clearer that the American book business is going to be a very different place in a very short period of time. For now, examples from what seem bits and pieces of a falling sky: Yesterday’s MobyLives story about Random House freezing employee benefits was followed by the company’s announcement later the same day that it’s boosting its efforts to build up its ebook library and expects to have some 15,000 titles — including books by major authors such as John Updike and Harlen Coben — available within just a few months. Following Friday’s MobyLives story about Barnes & Noble‘s historically bad third quarter earnings report, there’s yesterday’s Wall Street Journal story by Jeffrey Trachtenberg about the even worse earnings statement expected today from Borders Group Inc. Then there’s this story from blogger Ed Champion: it seems Borders has told the Independent Publishers Group — the country’s largest independent book distributor — that it won’t be paying them for two months, a devastating development for IPG’s client publishers, and a potential signal that Borders is on its last legs. Then, late yesterday afternoon came the report that was most stunning of them all: A Publishers Weekly alert that Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has told its editors to stop acquiring new books for an indeterminate period. According to PW’s Rachel Deahl, HMH’s vice president of communications Josef Blumenfeld confirmed the story after it was leaked to PW, although he said it was “not a permanent change.” Nonetheless Blumenfeld “hedged on when the ban might be lifted,” says Deahl. Instead, he insisted “it’s a symbol of doing things smarter; it’s not an indicator of the end of literature.”