Very famous author. She won the pulitzer prize for fiction. Her books are both beautifully written and hard to read because of their often brutal depiction of the racism African-American's experience in the U.S.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toni_Morrison

Since she died recently, there are several new articles that explain/summarize who she was. Here's an example:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/nobel-laureate-toni-morrison-ha...

discussed on HN at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20625132