Parents need to know that The Bluest Eye is the first novel by Nobel-prize winning author Toni Morrison. The book is a complex investigation of ideas of physical beauty among blacks and whites and the ways racial attitudes and other life experiences damage the lives of these characters. Pecola Breedlove's self-hatred and her wish for blue eyes are an outgrowth of the way she's treated by her family and the world in which she lives. Sexual behavior is also very complicated in this novel from 1970. Sex acts and feelings between adults are described, and more than one grown man behaves inappropriately with young girls. There is also incest and domestic violence, including a sexual assault on an 11-year-old girl. Even teens may need some adult guidance to understand the world of the novel, in which many characters seem driven by emotional and sexual feelings they can't control.
