Atlanta author Mary Kay Andrews

As soon as the book launch invitation hit our Facebook in-box Wednesday, we made sure we got on the phone with New York Times best-selling Atlanta author Mary Kay Andrews.

Our former AJC colleague (who still allows scribbler types like us refer to her as Kathy Trocheck) is about to hit the road to promote her latest hilarious novel, “The Fixer Upper,” (Harper, $25.99) officially due out June 23.

However, local fans can score autographed copies at the book’s launch party set for June 22 from 6 to 8 p.m. at Feast Restaurant in Decatur. Desserts will be supplied by Sweet N Sinful and The Book Exchange will bring the tomes.

In “The Fixer Upper,” Andrews introduces readers to a brand-new set of characters and a new fictional Southern town, Guthrie, Georgia. That’s where high-powered Washington D.C. lobbyist Dempsey Killebrew  retreats to after a political scandal results in her firing.

That’s also where she encounters the dilapidated Pepto Bismol-hued family home that’s being squatted in. And in typical Mary Kay Andrews fashion, “stuff” starts to happen.

“It’s what I love to write about,” Andrews told us. “Women whose lives are turned upside down by something and how they manage to right themselves. And if you can throw in a little decorator porn along the way, so much the better!”

Interestingly, Andrews (aka Trocheck and her family) was purchasing a similarly colorful, fixer upper last year on Tybee Island as she wrote the book.

“It was eerie!” she said laughing. “We even had a squatter too. There were some interesting parallels to what I was writing. Well, except the FBI isn’t after me!”

This summer on her book tour, fans can expect to follow dispatches from the author on Twitter as well. Reluctantly, as it turns out.

Cracks Andrews: “I’m not ["Late Night With"] Jimmy Fallon going into a meeting with my writers. My life is much more mundane. It’ll be more like ‘Mary Kay Andrews is trying to make a jpeg work!’ ”

For complete signing info: marykayandrews.com