‘Today’s Hoda Kotb Admits She’s Only Read Two Of Jenna Bush Hager’s Dozens Of Book Club Picks — And She Got The Titles Wrong: “It Is Not Called ‘Pants On Fire’”

By Radhamely De Leon
Published March 1, 2024, 12:00 p.m. ET

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Today with Hoda & Jenna

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Today With Hoda & Jenna kicked off on Friday (Mar. 1) with an emotional celebration marking the 5th anniversary of Jenna Bush Hager‘s book club, Read With Jenna.

In her praise for her co-host, Hoda Kotb dropped some impressive stats about Read With Jenna: Of the 63 titles that have been picked by the book club, 41 went on to become New York Times bestsellers and 32 were optioned for film or television. But she also shared another shocking statistic: Only two of these 63 picks were read by Kotb herself.

“How many have you read?!” Bush Hager demanded of her co-host.

While Kotb sheepishly confessed she only read one, Bush Hager appeared to remember that she had read at least two books from the book club over the years. “I can’t remember [which] but you took it on a trip, do you remember?” she asked Kotb. “Does that sound vaguely familiar? And you liked it because you texted me. I’ll have to go through our texts, but two, Hoda has read two.”

That appeared to help job Kotb’s memory because she recommended, “Read Pants On Fire from the early days, it was really good.”

“It’s called Nothing to See Here, it’s not even called Pants on Fire,” Bush Hager corrected, causing them both to laugh. The Today hosts were discussing the 2019 novel Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson that went on to become a NYT bestseller.

“Well, the picture has someone’s drawers on fire,” Kotb explained.

“It is one of my favorite books but it isn’t called Pants On Fire,” Bush Hager said.

Earlier on in their conversation, Bush Hager became emotional as Kotb praised everything she’d accomplished with Read With Jenna.

“I am so proud of you I just want to say from the very first time you started this, you start it with love. This is something you loved before all of it, before teaching, before TV, before all of this,” Kotb said as Bush Hager began tearing up. “Anybody can have an idea, ideas don’t work. They need you.”

“That’s so sweet!” Bush Hager replied. “I’m so happy to be part of it.”

Today with Jenna and Hoda airs on weekdays at 10/9c on NBC.