When you’re the “rock star” of the book world, it’s easy to get away with a little bathroom humor.

Nancy Pearl, the former librarian who has made a national name for herself through her “Book Lust” bestseller and her frequent appearances on National Public Radio, returned to Langley this week to give her picks for the best books of 2006.

Speaking before an audience of more than 170 at the Whidbey Island Center for the Arts Monday, Pearl recalled her stay at a historic hotel in Portland, Ore.

It was a water-closet cliffhanger.

Getting set for a big day planned by her publisher, Pearl recounted how she went to take a shower, pausing to read a sign on the bathroom door that said, “If you take a bath or a shower, be sure to either open the window of the bathroom or close the door.”

Workers at the hotel had hung the sign so steam from the shower wouldn’t set off the smoke alarm.

But Pearl said she gave up on opening a window after she couldn’t get it to budge more than an inch or so.

“I got a little bit anxious, and thought, that’s not enough, I better close the door,” she said.

But as Pearl pulled shut the door, the handle started to jiggle, the door closed, the handle wouldn’t move and Pearl was struck that she was stuck.

Panic ensued.

“I thought, ‘Oh my God, I am locked in a bathroom in the Mallory Hotel and I have nothing to read,” she said, drawing big guffaws from the crowd.

“I thought, how long can I go on? Reading and rereading the label on the tube of toothpaste — there’s no character development, the writing is quite indifferent,” Pearl continued, amid rising laughter from the audience.

Channeling the teenage mystery-solver Nancy Drew — but not in the “woooo, wooooooo!” supernatural way, she said — Pearl recounted freeing herself by miraculously tightening the door handle with a pair of manicure scissors.

“And with my heart like pounding, I tried the door handle, and it opened,” she said in mock shock.

Pearl than admitted she was no super sleuth. On her way out of the bathroom, she turned to notice a telephone on one wall.

In a fast-paced hour, Pearl sized up other stories more succinctly as she made her way down a list of 20 must-reads, ranging from non-fiction books about 9/11 and the Iraq War to memoirs to children’s books.

Pearl soon departed from her hand-out list of best books, though. And many in the audience quickly pulled out pens and pads of paper, as if Pearl was a teacher who had just said, “This will be on the final.”

Like a menu made of appetizers, Pearl offered quick and tasty book bites that left the audience wanting more.

On “One Good Turn,” by Kate Atkinson: “It’s not really a whodunit, it’s a whydunit,” Pearl said.

On “Magic for Beginners,” by Kelly Link: “The title story is unbelievably brilliant. I sat down and wrote a letter to the author, which I never do. But I was just blown away by the story and by the quality of her writing.”

On “To Hate Like This Is to Be Happy Forever: A Thoroughly Obsessive, Intermittently Uplifting, and Occasionally Unbiased Account of the Duke-North Carolina Basketball Rivalry,” by Will Bythe: “You’ll certainly want to watch Duke all the time. And root against them.”

On “Truck: A Love Story,” by Michael Perry: “Reading his feelings about reading seed catalogs, it made me just want to go out and buy a hoe,” Pearl said.

Pearl’s popularity? She looks for “books beneath the radar.”

She doesn’t push the bestsellers of the day; the ones riding the crest of The New York Times bestsellers list. Instead, she’s much more likely to give a nod to an old classic she’s just discovered four months ago, such as Thomas Berger’s “Little Big Man” from 1964, or books that need readers to overcome the “yuk” factor first, like “The Girls,” a Lori Lansens’ novel about Rose and Ruby, a pair of conjoined twins who grow up outside Ontario, Canada in the 1950s.

It was Pearl’s eighth or ninth visit to Whidbey; both Pearl and the Friends of Langley Library, who sponsored the visit, said they had lost count.

“It’s such an island of readers. They’ve always been just a joy,” Pearl said later.

Whidbey Island was a last stop for Pearl before she takes a cruise ship to Australia and New Zealand, where she will be part of the on-board entertainment.

Pearl’s popularity — she’s an autograph-signing celebrity beyond the literary world and was the inspiration for the Librarian Action Figure (“with amazing push-button shushing action,” the package reads) — may stem from the fact that readers make the best book recommendations.

“People are really interested in finding good books to read. And it’s really hard to find somebody who sort of is not setting themselves above you and saying, ‘This is a classic — you have to read that.’”

“Plus, I’m a bit of a ham,” Pearl laughed.

Brian Kelly can be reached at 221-5300 or bkelly@southwhidbeyrecord.com.