The coalition is likely to go under the name the Open Book Alliance.
It has been formed to challenge a settlement between Google and representatives of authors and publishers, which would give Google the right to commercialise digital copies of out-of-print books that it is in the process of making.
The settlement has been criticised from various quarters, including the Internet Archive, a not-for-profit organisation which seeks to build a free internet library offering permanent access for researchers, historians, and scholars to historical collections that exist in digital format.
That settlement was brought about by a lawsuit against Google from the Authors Guild and members of the Association of American Publishers, after they accused Google of scanning thousands of copyrighted books without permission from the copyright holders.
This resulted in millions of dollars being paid by Google to be shared by authors whose works were affected.
It also allowed for Google to continue with the project, authors receiving 70% of the sales of any titles and Google taking the other 30%.
However, it is being probed by the US Justice Department, which has sent formal requests to Google and book publishers for information on the deal.
The Open Book Alliance is being advised by Gary Reback, who is a lawyer from the Silicon Valley-based firm Carr & Ferrell, which specialises in antitrust cases.
Reback has previously acted against Microsoft, but differences are being set aside for this case.
Reback told the New York Times: "This deal has enormous, far-reaching anticompetitive consequences that people are just beginning to wake up to."