This book […] is the truest thing I’ve read in a long time. — Patrick Lagacé, La Presse

Your book is a lifesaver, JeePee, as your daddy used to call you. — Régis Labeaume, Previous Mayor of Québec, La Presse

The first detonation occurred when Patrick Lagacé signed his paper in La Presse. During the Salon du livre de Québec, Jeanne and her team had to hide copies so that the author could do his signing sessions. Shannon Desbiens (Les Bouquinistes), who was helping out at the booth, saw in their eyes a surge of excitement mixed with a certain panic at seeing the books literally fly off the shelves. And that was a week before the explosion that would follow Jean-Philippe Pleau’s appearance on Tout le monde en parle, in an interview that many consider one of the best ever on the show. — Jean-Benoît Dumais, Les Libraires

For readers of Edouard Louis and Didier Eribon

Born to an illiterate father and a mother with little schooling, Jean-Philippe Pleau grew up in a working-class family on Duplessis Street in Drummondville, Quebec. However, the circumstances of his life enabled him to pursue university studies in sociology and become a radio host. Today, he’s a stranger to the world he came from, without really belonging to the one he ended up in. Duplessis Street is the story of this social rift. It’s a moving account of Jean-Philippe Pleau’s internal migration, sometimes violent, often surprising, never banal.

It’s the story of a life that reads like a love letter to his parents: a love divided by class distance.