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On the Up

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In this wild, stylish, wickedly funny debut, Shilo Jones charts the journey of three players caught in a high-stakes property development--a dangerous and depraved game that plays out behind the veneer of everyday city life.

Jasminder is determined. Carl is blitzed. Mark is righteous.

Unfortunately, they've pitted themselves against one another and they're throwing everything they have at the same condo development in North Vancouver. The Solstice deal promises what they want most for themselves--freedom, respect, status, wealth--and it is their chance to be truly "on the up."

Over the course of a week, the trio vie for their piece. But there are complex personal obstacles standing in the way for each. Jasminder Bansal, an aspiring journalist with a powerful ambition and a family connection to gangland violence, is playing a dangerous game to get the information she needs from a slick property lawyer with links to an international criminal boss. Carl "Blitzo" Reed, co-founder of an ecological investment firm, has a wildly distorted sense of reality and a morally questionable connection to the property. Mark Ward, a veteran of the Afghanistan War with a strong conscience, is barely coping with the effects of PTSD, but he's forced to call on the skills he has learned as a soldier in order to repay a debt to his criminal brother, Clint. Jasminder, Blitzo, and Mark use anything at their disposal in pursuit of their goal, and no one is left untouched: speculators, government officials, realtors, activists, builders, day-laborers, foreign investors, lawyers--even a pot-bellied pig.

On the Up introduces Shilo Jones as a writer with a singular voice. Here he gives us a raucous, biting satire, packed with bleak humour, outrageous characters, and pathos, that shows us what can happen when greed, desperation, will, loyalty, and an insatiable desire for status collide.

464 pages, Paperback

First published May 15, 2018

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318 people want to read

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Shilo Jones

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5 stars
11 (11%)
4 stars
21 (22%)
3 stars
19 (20%)
2 stars
27 (29%)
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14 (15%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 31 reviews
Profile Image for David.
795 reviews383 followers
June 25, 2018
It's told from three perspectives and starts off simply enough with aspiring journalist Jasminder Bansal working for a massive development firm to cozy up to the man who employed her brother's killer.

Mark Ward left his wife and child in Bangkok to return to Vancouver to work with his criminal brother. He's barely hanging on with some severe PTSD after a stint in Afghanistan

And then we meet Carl "Blitzo" Reed and things go off the rails fast. It's Hunter S Thompson channelling Douglas Coupland and I don't know what's real anymore. I get it - Carl's a drug fuelled addict running a green investment firm who talks to a pig. It becomes a problem when the pig talks back.

It's a swirling maelstrom of a narrative from a Vancouver native trying to foster a unique voice for the city but there was nothing to hold onto. Out at the edges it's frayed and messy but nearing the end it hits a singular point of clarity for each of the characters that felt like the beating heart of the story. Which is a fancy way of saying I invested a lot of time wading through the confusion for a brief moment of clarity.

I will admit that Vincent Peele is painfully good, a delicious character to hate read, and may be indicative of my own biases. He is what we here in Ontario probably envision when we think of those off on the west coast living in Lotus Land.
Profile Image for Caitlin Merritt.
444 reviews15 followers
April 23, 2018
Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada and Shilo Jones for the free advance copy!!

First of all, the cover is so gorgeous, I almost want to give an extra star just for that. Almost.

I didn't love this book. I didn't hate it either, but I just think it wasn't for me. The writing was a little much for me - a little too much slang and ALL CAPS and incoherence.

The plot was really, really hard to follow for the first 200 pages. Two of the three POV characters are really high a lot of the time and this leads to difficult to follow stream-of-consciousness narratives and weird dialogue with a talking pot-bellied pig. It got better in the second half, and I was a bit invested in Jasminder's storyline toward the end, but ultimately this isn't a book I'd recommend.
Profile Image for Kevin.
281 reviews1 follower
June 22, 2018
💤💤💤💤💤💤💤💤💤💤

This book needs to be edited down. There is no reason why it needs to be 400+ pages, ESPECIALLY for a debut novel in the crime genre. Keep it short and snappy, show people what you’re made of, and then go for the epic mafia saga next time.

Vancouver isn’t that interesting. Sorry West Coast folks. You haven’t convinced me yet.
The cover is most definitely the coolest part of this book. Well done Terri Nimmo.

This book was the embodiment of the Sysphian myth. Is that what “on the up” means? Up the hill? Pushing this boulder of a novel? Forever and ever?

Anyway, don’t waste your time on this one, readers.
Profile Image for Liz.
431 reviews
August 26, 2018
Sometime last year, I remember saying to a Vancouver friend that the real estate situation here was so f***ed up, I wished someone would make some art about it to help me understand or cope with what was going on. Maybe write a novel or something. And then, voila! On the Up landed in stores. This book is a chaotic whirlwind of drug-fuelled capitalism gone wrong, hyper-local references, and sharp digs at the mindlessly pro-Vancouver affirmations spouted by the business sector and other members of society who have drunk the Kool-Aid and are desperately still trying to convince themselves that this is, as the slogan says, the Best Place on Earth. (Because if it's not, why are we all still here?) I would recommend this book to any current or ex-Vancouverite who (a) can commit to 400+ pages of what often resembles prose poetry, and (b) has connections to or feelings about the real estate sector. I think many of this book's finer points would, however, be lost on non-locals.
Profile Image for Dora Okeyo.
Author 26 books203 followers
February 21, 2018
This book played a number on me. It sent me on a wild chase and by the time it hit me that three people were all out to get the same thing, I felt like I needed a pot of coffee!
I received an advance readers digital copy of the book from NetGalley, and there were some formatting issues that made the transition whilst reading such a chore. It'd be great to have each chapter that's introducing a character in bold and on it's own page.
Profile Image for Amber Daugherty.
108 reviews7 followers
August 14, 2018
I simultaneously loved and hated this book (leaning slightly more towards hating it) because it was just so CHAOTIC. The story revolves around a piece of real estate in Vancouver and the sketchy characters who are trying to secure it, involving people with ties to gangs, the government, the military and more. What you'll immediately notice in this book is that everything is distorted - we're given front row seats to each character and learn about the world explicitly from their perspectives. That means that when someone named Blitzo is talking to his potbellied pig (named Holdout) and together they find a secret button in his Tesla that takes him, naked, directly to the airport so he can pick up his daughter, you're completely in his head the entire time. Which was mostly why this book was so infuriating and also what made it incredible - you will intimately know these characters by the end, understanding their motives, their thought processes and how they work. The issue is that nothing is clear - you may not be able to tell which way is up.

In a nutshell, Jasminder's brother was killed by a man named Clint who is the hired muscle for a real estate lawyer named Vincent Peele. Jasminder, a journalist, thinks that if she can get dirt on Peele, she can get back at Clint. Clint's brother is a war veteran who's constantly high who helps his brother. When Clint finds out what Jasminder is trying to do, he gives his brother the task of taking care of the situation - and the result may not be what you expected.

Would caution anyone trying to read this - it's not easy and it's not altogether satisfying. Fun character development though and good if you're looking for something very different.
Profile Image for Emily J.
274 reviews1 follower
February 12, 2019
I received a copy of this book through the Goodreads Giveaway program in exchange for an honest review. This was a tough, slow, meandering read. As other reviewers noted, it reads like stream of consciousness drug-addled rough draft and is too long. There were nuggets of plot that were intriguing and a few good paragraphs in the second half that I may refer back to, but overall would not recommend.
Profile Image for Sonja.
685 reviews27 followers
April 20, 2018
This was not a straightforward four stars. I completely hated the book for the first 250 pages, the plot was vague and the writing style was over the top, in your face, like REM's "It's the end of the world" playing too fast and too loud , please make it stop!!!!!

So, either I adapted to his style of writing or things slowed down enough for me to enjoy the writing, the last 200 pages felt more diluted and coherent and I could fully appreciate what went into this book. Whoever said sarcasm is the lowest form of wit was wrong. Shilo Jones used it perfectly to convey humour, wisdom and truth.

4 stars for On the up, and let me be completely honest, one of them was for that cover. Thank you Goodreads and Shilo Jones for the advance copy.
Profile Image for AudreyLovesParis.
282 reviews21 followers
February 26, 2019
The cover design is absolutely amazing, and if I ever write the great Canadian novel, I will get Terry Nimmo (who designed it) to design mine. But the novel is like a beautifully wrapped gift that contains a present that you don’t like and didn’t want. The writing is annoying, particularly since there are several different narrators and the exact same style is used for all of them. It is important to have distinct voices for each narrator if that is the route you are going. And if I eve here the term “Vancity” again in my life, it will be too soon.
Profile Image for Patricia L..
573 reviews
July 14, 2018
If you are at all interested in the REAL Vancouver read this book.
Vincent Peele ( is this name a coincidence?) says“Look at this city. Nowhere like it! We are so. Lucky.”

The novel is about a development deal - "Knock it down and bang it up."

I'd love to see them selling this book at the Naam restaurant on 4th (Rainbow) Avenue
"Sipping ethically sourced strawberry leaf, nettle, and licorice root tea."
"Urban dystopian accessory pockets?"

Really you've got to read it.
52 reviews1 follower
April 30, 2018
Three people, each with their own agendas, end up involved in the same property development and they all work to pursue their own gains. The characters were believable, if flawed.

It was an interesting read.
103 reviews
June 6, 2018
I won this book in a Goodreads Giveaway. I would like to write a proper review, but I cannot read any more. I’m on page 30 and have to stop reading. I don’t care for the style of writing. I don’t like the characters that have been introduced. So far a lot of long winded and one sided dialogue.
Profile Image for Joan.
42 reviews2 followers
June 20, 2018
I found this book extremely difficult to get into and after getting about halfway through, decided I just wasn’t interested enough to finish it. I rated it a three as it was okay, not bad enough to rate it lower, just not my type of book.
7 reviews
August 26, 2018
I received this book through Goodreads. This was a hard book to read. It jumped around so much between characters that I couldn't understand where the author was going with the plot line or what the book was about. Not a book I would recommend to anyone to read.
Profile Image for Patricia Gallant.
382 reviews15 followers
October 11, 2018
This book was confusing for me. The story is about money laundering through real estate. It was a very confusing story line for me. The end was disappointing.

I did not like the author's writing style. Short incomplete sentences through all POV narrations.
Profile Image for Lisa.
27 reviews2 followers
September 17, 2018
A wild read and I'm still figuring out what happened in the end.. but brilliant.
A lot of social commentary going on, seamlessly integrated into the narrative with the 3 first-person narrators.
Profile Image for Melinda.
650 reviews11 followers
May 30, 2018
I received an ARC through Goodreads.
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I was not a fan of this book. It felt very scattered and not a lot of background was dived into or provided until much later on.

I did not connect with any of the characters. Mark and Carl were on drugs most of the time, so whatever they were saying and doing didn't make a lot of sense. I honestly was not a fan of their story for the most part, until much later in the book.

Carl's narrative was so wacky, over the top and confusing that most of the time I don't know what is real and what is drug induced, plus he makes zero sense and yet he is tolerated because he is like an eccentric genius or something. WTF. The real story of what lead him to go to jail, to lead the discovery of something that made him millions and his beef with the shadowy bad guy seems messy and never fully well explained.

Mark. I don't think we truly know what really happened all those years ago that left him owing a debt to his brother. Besides being injured in the war, we don't know his entire history with his girlfriend and daughter and why he chose to stay out of the country but only came back at the request of his brother.

Jasminder is an interesting one. She had a the potential to be a journalist but threw it all away to get closer to the people who murdered her brother a few short years ago. Her story got more interesting as it went along, I wondered what happened to her afterwards though.

Overall, it was an interesting story but it wasn't quite fleshed out as well as I would have liked.
Profile Image for Chelsea Girard.
Author 9 books25 followers
May 21, 2018
Through the witty uncensored journey on On The Up, I loved the raw and charismatic journey of Jasminder, Carl and Mark as they fight through their circumstances head on. Devouring the minds of the characters from their perspective in Shilo Jones's book gave me a new dream for my writing - to be raw and mind boggling.


“I am the thing itself. Without idea or image, theory or ideology. Just an object in motion. Existing before the conscious mind. That’s how I’m beginning to think of myself. One day I hope to stop thinking entirely. Thought removes us from our true selves.”

On The Up captures the raw disclosure of grief, loyalty and heartaches. Within the characters lives, you meet so many people that you can connect with on both a mental and emotional level. I loved witnessing the minds of the characters as the storyline was fairly different from anything I have read recently as the way the book is presented and thought out is talked about differently. As many books have the narrator who talks about what they are doing, this book is narrated from the characters perspective and so are the actions so it was fairly different but I loved every moment.

Overall, I would give this book 4/5 stars because I found it a raw and real read. The characters were amazingly relatable and I loved the plot of the entire story as it kept me intrigued the entire time. Great first voice for Shilo Jones’ book.
194 reviews2 followers
April 21, 2018
I won a copy of this book from GoodReads. I was eager to read it when I saw that it takes place in and around Vancouver, B.C. as this is where I grew up. And it was written by a Canadian author and I always like to read books by other Canadians. I enjoyed this book and so I gave it a 4 star rating. The reason I did not give it 5 stars was that I found it quite hard to really get into the book. I quickly got used to the fact that it went from one character to another but I found that when it went to one of the characters, Carl "Blitzo" Reed, I seemed to somewhat lose interest or maybe it was that I felt kinda confused about exactly what was happening. But eventually even this character's sections of the book became very enjoyable. And the fact that it took place in Vancouver was definitely an added bonus for me. All in all I found this to be a most enjoyable book and I would recommend that others read it as well.
Profile Image for D.
49 reviews2 followers
August 24, 2018
I'm not sure exactly how to rate this. I did not enjoy reading this book. But I don't think it's poorly written. The chaotic style felt heavy handed but different/interesting.

I will say that the author commits one of my biggest pet peeves. He writes that Knight St. connects the American border and several suburbs of the Lower Mainland to Vancouver when Knight St. only connects Vancouver and Richmond. It's a small thing, but it drives me crazy when a book that is all about its location can't get the details right.

Overall this book offers some humorous and valid critiques of Vancouver(ites). However, at times the book feels as pretentious as the people it is trying to criticize.
Profile Image for Janice.
278 reviews
May 13, 2018
The writing in this book was excellent as far as pacing, description, and the basic qualities one looks for in a novel go. However, without exception the characters were so odious and without any human merit that it made the whole story seem very heavy handed.I got bogged down wondering what the author was thinking rather then just reading a novel. I was a bit disappointed with this ARC because the premise was so intriguing.
Profile Image for Cam.
1 review
July 20, 2020
As a lifelong BC resident, I find this book accurately captures the 'feel' of Vancouver and its surrounds through the perspectives of the different characters as developed. The brothers were actually my favourite - these two are pulled directly from the Fraser/Lynn Valley tough kids that I would encounter growing up. Shilo nailed these two characters. And of course it all revolves around real estate - a fraught topic in BC since the closing of Expo 86.
55 reviews2 followers
June 11, 2018
This was a Goodreads Giveaway book.

Overall I had difficulty with this book. While there is some strong writing and interesting characters in the book, it was far too frenetic and off-pace for me to truly enjoy. It is written in a style akin to Douglas Coupland but unfortunately just didn't come across with the same fluidity that a book of such nature needs to keep the reader engaged.
33 reviews
April 18, 2018
The cover is absolutely stunning! And so is what lies behind the cover. This a a great interconnected story taking place in British Columbia which as I Canadian I automatically love! Would definitely this book to others.
Profile Image for Melissa McGuire.
256 reviews4 followers
June 14, 2018
I loved this book! It kept me intrigued and i needed to know what was going to happen next
1 review
September 25, 2022
Lose your mind and embrace your inner Blitzo.

The way this dense and heavy tome about real estate agents subverted my expectations was subtle at first. A picture of a pig. A strange passage about 'Ryan' chosen over a table of contents. I read the first chapter and set it down and eyed it with suspicion for a few weeks. Why aren't the Chapters numbered, why is the paper so soft? As I eyed it, it eyed back into me. This polished pink monstrosity on the counter couldn't really just be a coming of age tale about a Punjabi realtor making it in the city, I thought. I wasn't sure what I had in front of me. When I picked it back up I flipped to a random page, in my case that was page 263, where I was blown away by "Blitzo" and the "OVERSEER" negotiating some mad scene about big pharma and prison shankings with some of the most creative prose I've read since Bukowski's Post Office. Page 263 did not disappoint and I slammed through the rest of this book voraciously, needing to know it's secrets. And wow, what a voice. Jones ruthlessly dissects these characters for all they're worth. It's a slow burn but man does it deliver. If you're looking for musings on the state of this city and its transient inhabitants, do yourself a favour and skip Copeland's City of Glass to pick this up instead.

5/5 rat infested shoebox zen gardens.
414 reviews14 followers
April 26, 2019
I won this book in a Goodreads Giveaway. I didn't like the writing style with all it's short sentences. I didn’t like the characters that were introduced. There was a lot of long winded dialogue that did not interest me at all. Only good thing for me was it is set in Vancouver and the story is about money laundering through real estate. It was a very confusing story and I ended up skimming most of the book. I will not be reading any more of this authors books.
Profile Image for Kelly S.
78 reviews2 followers
July 28, 2020
I’m not really sure how this book got published. I picked it up at Costco in British Columbia bc the story sounded interesting and it was set in Vancouver. DNF - this book dragged and I didn’t care about what the characters were doing.
Profile Image for Marni.
1,202 reviews
April 21, 2025
I should have read the review on the back...."Like Elmore Leonard in yoga pants.....told in prose that is jazzy, foulmouthed, delirious, and poetic....."

I made it to page 128 and said to myself - STOP!
Profile Image for Malcolm Van.
Author 3 books7 followers
July 11, 2019
Poetic, gritty, psychopathic and addictive. About money laundering in a North Van property deal, the story fell apart a bit at the end but all in all, a fantastic read. High five!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 31 reviews

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