There is something in what you are saying… and I have had a lot of similar discussions in the past months…but I think you are over-doing it a bit…
I mean, yes, there is a lack of really interesting, ground-breaking, new titles with most of the major publishers. but saying that there simply are no good books out there- is simply wrong. I think I have read more excellent boks from writers I never heard of in the past 3 or 4 years than in the 15 years before that…. but there might be a reason for the way you are limiting yourself — and it just occurred to me( I know, I know… when I do these replies I tend to write as I think…I do not plan my replies) ….
Most, if bnot all, of those new books and new writers I am talking about are from outside the US, ( BTW- the Germans and the Scandinavians are doing amazing work) …so, if you limit yourself to going through the publications of the big american houses, you will most likely fail to find anything interesting. But, if you start looking outside of the US , or even as simply as looking at what smaller American houses are publishing- you will find some truly great things…
OF course, there is another possibility ( But I doubt this one very much) and that is , that you ar looking for certain kind of writing and certain kind of subjects… I dunno what it may be… the russian school of Dostoevsky type… Maybe the creepy atmosphere of Lovecraft and Poe… poetry written the way only Neruda could do it…..
In that case, you are completely out of luck- but it has nothing to do with th publishers. It is just like with music and film… that kind of writing is simply done and over with…. No one expects anyone to start writing and recording song that the BEatles or Presley would sing.. (Yes I agree they were better than today's DJ-s but it is simply a matter of taste) …. no new writer is going to try and emulate the old writers- and I am not talking about Poe or Baudelaire , even HEmingway seems a bit ancient to the young ones… and I suppose that is the way it should be