Holt gets a new chief

Stephen Rubin, who resigned last month from Random House Inc., will be the president and publisher of Henry Holt and Co., where authors include Man Booker Prize winner Hilary Mantel and National Book Award finalist Greg Grandin.

Rubin was the longtime head of the Broadway Doubleday division of Random House and published John Grisham, Pat Conroy and Dan Brown.

Holt has released such popular books as Barbara Ehrenreich’s “Nickel and Dimed,” but is better known for publishing more low-profile, literary titles, a direction that will change now, said John Sargent, chief executive of Macmillan, Holt’s parent company.

“We’re moving Holt from being sort of a midlist-driven, serious publisher to being pretty front and center,” Sargent said Tuesday.