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Buy a Copy
This means that although Syrup isn't especially common on bookstore shelves, it is available: any store can order it in for you. You should also have no trouble picking up a copy online.
But otherwise, it's the same deal as in the US: bookstores will either have copies on the shelves or be able to get one in for you.
Recently, however, Amazon.co.uk has made the American version available to Brits - and it's even discounted. You can grab it here.
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Syrup went briefly out of print in late 2002, before
being revived in April 2003 when its publisher realized the nation didn't deserve to be
deprived of this excellent work of literature, or could sell a bunch of copies on the back
of Jennifer Government, or something.
Syrup has never been easy to find in Canada: according
to my royalty statement, it sold a grand total of about 150 copies there. This surely
makes it one of the most unpopular novels in Canadian history. What happened? I have no
idea. Maybe the truck with all the copies rolled off a cliff somewhere between New York
and Toronto.
Syrup was never released in the UK, and there are no
plans for a British edition yet. Why this is so is one of those questions that plagues
mankind throughout the ages, like where odd socks go. The feedback I got at the time
(1998) was that the story felt "too American." Since I'm Australian, this made
me laugh and laugh until my throat got all choked up with hot, bitter bile.
Copies were plentiful in Australia and New
Zealand right up until Jennifer Government came out, at which point Penguin
promptly ran out of stock. You couldn't buy it for a while, then they
discovered a whole bunch of copies that had slipped down the back of a couch
or something,
and now they're selling those. Most bookstores won't
have it on the shelf, but they can easily get it in for you.