I will be online starting at 8pm to comment on the results as they come in. There are surprises in every election; I expect this one to be no different (and given the surprises from 2007, who knows, maybe Quebeckers will give us plenty of surprises!). Feel free to post your comments below.

Note: my apologies, but the live-blog will be in my first language (english).

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7:56
T minus 4 minutes. So exciting! It’s like Christmas for geeks.
Grab the popcorn and your beverage of choice, ’cause here we go…

8:01
First deputy elected leading is a Liberal, according to Radio-Canada… make that 2 Liberals.

8:07
Early results from Iles-de-la-Madeleine have Liberal Germain Chevarie leading (but only 3 of 49 polls reporting). Overall results so far: none elected, 10 PLQ leading, 3 PQ leading, 1 ADQ leading.

8:11
Overall vote share so far: PLQ 47.2%, PQ 34.9%, ADQ 13.7%, QS 2.9%, PVQ 1.1%. Only about 11,000 votes in so far, so it’s super early. I’ve gotta say, that CBC’s got the best results tracking… Still no one elected, but PLQ now with 20 leading, PQ 8, ADQ 2.

8:23
We have our first elected deputy! Yvon Marcoux in Vaudreuil. No surprise there.

8:31
PLQ Charlotte L’Ecuyer elected in Pontiac. No surprise. Also PLQ Monique Jerome-Forget in Marguerite-Bourgeoys. PQ Alexandre Cloutier in Lac-Saint-Jean. PQ Nicole Leger in Point-aux-Trembles.

8:31
Radio Canada declares Liberal majority government. From now on, I will just comment on any surprising results…

10:20
OK, I’m back. Sorry, I got entranced by the results coming in… so Amir Khadir wins in Mercier! I can’t say I’m all that surprised. My model put Turp a couple points ahead but you will noticed that I didn’t make a call in Mercier, because the projection range for Turp and Khadir overlapped, which means there is an equally likely chance of either candidate winning. So congrats to the Quebec Solidaire!

I bit surprised by the weakness of the Liberals in Laurion-Dorion and Crémazie. The latter was, of course, too close to call (and I didn’t), but I didn’t think the former would be as close (although the Liberals are currently holding a narrow lead).

No real surprise in Groulx, as it was too close to call. It could have gone either way.

I guess I’m also a bit surprised at the weakness of the Liberals in some of the Montérégie ridings such as Iberville, La Prairie, and Saint-Jean. All of these were too close to call (so I didn’t), but it appears the PQ was a bit stronger than the model suggested.

I thought Gaspé would be close, but the Liberal ran away with it, so that’s a surprise.

The ADQ held a bit more of their vote in Capital-National. I suspected they would, but I tried to let the model dictate. We saw this as well in the Federal election with the Conservatives. So the ADQ held Chauveau, which is not surprising. But I’m surprised they held La Peltrie, although they do have a strong candidate there. But they did lose their other ridings in the area.

Overall, the Liberals are a bit worse and the PQ and ADQ a bit better than the model suggested, but the difference is pretty small. The QS and PVQ vote is about on par. The net result is that the Liberals probably win a few seats less and the PQ a few seats more than the model suggested. But nothing too radical.