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Burn-and-blow publishers argue that there is no correlation between their material, which often carries the caveat "for information purposes only," and the increasing rate of bombings across the nation. "I sell a thousand books, but there ain't a thousand explosions," says Billy Blann, the owner of Delta Press Ltd. of El Dorado, Arkansas. The flurry of orders after the Oklahoma bombing for the pamphlet Improvised Munitions from Ammonium Nitrate, he says, is "just armchair people who want to know what's going on.''
Hollywood too has become fascinated. With gunplay so common in real life, producers have turned to bombers as the villains du jour. On TV, the season finale of Melrose Place features a character who sets off a bomb at the apartment complex that houses the show's cast. The ABC soap opera All My Children contains a story line in which a character has been planning to bomb an ex-lover on his wedding day. In the wake of the Oklahoma bombing, producers of the soap opera say they are altering the bomb angle, while Melrose Place's producers are considering the same measure. At the movies, the new Chuck Norris film Top Dog begins with the bombing of an apartment building by neo-Nazis. Due May 19 is the Bruce Willis thriller Die Hard with a Vengeance, which opens with the bombing of a department store. Bombings have been featured in Speed, Blown Away and The Specialist. Moviemakers contend that they are merely reflecting reality. Says Graham Yost, the screenwriter for Speed: "We looked at bombings taking place all around the world and basically brought the conflict home to America." Tragically, real-life bombers may be doing the same thing. --Reported by Erik Larson and Jeffrey Ressner/New York and Elaine Shannon/Washington