Trying to get get hold of Irish books

franc 91

I live in France (not too far away from Paris) and I don't have une carte bleue - visa card. In Paris there is an amazing range of bookshops that specialise for example in selling books from Italy (La Tour de Babel), Germany (Marissal), Canada (The Abbey Bookshop), Russia, China, Catalonia, Portugal, Spain, Vietnam and I could go on and on. There are several American bookshops and there's WH Smith's selling books from the UK. Not for love or money can you get books published in Ireland - they're just not distributed - they're off the radar - the only exception is O'Brien because they now belong to Frances Lincoln and The Appletree Press though of course they're in Belfast - but it hasn't proved easy getting books from them either. Last year I suddenly realised that at the back of the on-line catalogue of An Gùm (which I had printed out in colour) they mentioned that they were distributed by Co-op Breizh (in Montparnasse) so I went along with the said catalogue, overjoyed with prospect of being able to order something from them, only to be told that in spite of the entry of Co-op Breizh in the catalogue, they hadn't done business with An Gùm for the last ten years at least. Irish is supposed to an official European language, there's the Irish Cultural Centre here (in the former Irish College), there are several thousands of Irish citizens here, not to mention the pubs (for example the Quiet Man has an Irish-speaking night every month) but there's no way you can go into a bookshop in Paris and buy or order books from the main Irish Gaelic publishers. I have complained, sent emails etc all without the slightest result. I also hear that there's an international fair every year in Dublin. Can anyone over on your side of the water do anything about it? Please - le do thoil.
Franc