FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Agoura Hills, California
“DEVIL BAT DIARY - The Journal of Johnny Layton” by Peter H. Brothers
Based on the 1940 public-domain film, “Devil Bat Diary” (ISBN: 9-781461-070924), tells the “true” story of what “really” happened to the unhappy citizens of Heathville, Illinois, during that terrible prewar summer, as recorded in the long-suppressed journals of Chicago City Register’s principal newspaper correspondent, Jonathan “Johnny” Layton.
For those unfamiliar with the story, the Devil Bats were furry fiends created by a scientific genius who believes himself wrongfully relegated to concocting perfumes and colognes which he despises for wages not worth mentioning. So, as a means to an embittered end, he manufactures an evil ointment with a scent that infuriates his giant bats to such an extent they feel compelled to tear-out the throats of their unsuspecting victims.
“Devil Bat Diary” tells for the first time the full inside story of what took place in ways not possible to show Production Code audiences back then, such as the fact that Chief Wilkins was in love with Layton, or that Mary Heath was a superstitious lunatic, or that Layton and his trusted picture-taking partner “One-Shot” McGuire couldn’t stand the sight of each other?
Published to mark the 70th Anniversary of the classic film and dedicated to the memory of Bela Lugosi, “Devil Bat Diary” is an unforgettably entertaining venture into a world filled with chirping Chiropterans, malicious murders and revolting revelations.
