Welcome to the Bank Street Children's Book Committee's (CBC) Searchable Best Books List, a tool designed to help educators, families, librarians, and others access developmentally appropriate and engaging books for young readers (ages birth - 18).

Our online Searchable Best Books List draws from the committee's annual Best Children's Books of the Year-beginning with the list of books published in 2000-with each featuring more than 600 high-quality titles for young readers.

To share feedback about the tool, please feel free to email bookcom@bankstreet.edu. To learn more about the CBC, visit https://www.bankstreet.edu/cbc/.

How to Perform a Search and Save a List

Gilbert & Sullivan Set Me Free

by Kathleen Karr

Ages: 12+

Published: 2003

Publisher: Hyperion

ISBN: 0-7868-1916-2

Keywords: Prison

At the onset of World War I, a sixteen-year-old is sentenced to a woman's prison. A sympathetic chaplain transforms the inmates lives with music. Largely based on real incidents.