Reader’s Digest and friends are in serious pain. Will their prescription work?

With its mounting debt, the company may be longer on vision than on time. But the publishing industry's general duress may give the heavily leveraged company some bargaining power. While its creditors may wish they'd passed on RDA debt, analysts like Moody's Puchalla still give good marks to the company's management and strategy. Even if the company's capital structure is unsustainable, the prospect of railroading the company into bankruptcy or halting Berner's and Ripplewood's restructuring efforts won't be appealing.

Just as RDA is facing some hard choices, its publications are looking to sound a hopeful note. Adler says RDA won't be infusing its publications with a Christian flavor across the board. Rather, the company's editorial content will list more generally toward the feel-good and uplifting: kids beating cancer, women shedding pounds, Arabian horses being saved from starvation. Perhaps that's just what readers are looking for these days. But barring a miraculous turnaround in Pleasantville, the company may find that the only signs of inspiration in a tumbling economy lie inside its own magazines' pages.

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