Sharon Whitlock

The White Rose Affair: Featuring the Intermediate Jazzicals Synchronized Skating Team Sharon Whitlock

"We must keep working. We have to tell the story of what happened during the Holocaust. Our synchro program will help people understand. No one must ever forget."

A few weeks after 9/11, African-American coach Jems Wilson choreographs a "Holocaust" program for the Jazzicals Intermediate Synchronized Skating Team. The program is supposed to fight hatred and teach the world how to love. Instead, the program seems to ignite a wave of hate crimes against the Jazzicals and their coach. Racist symbols desecrate property, skates are vandalized, and violent threats are raised against Jems.

In response, the team forms a White Rose Club, inspired by the World War II underground resistance organization called "The White Rose." Hundreds of skaters from all over the world join the club and pledge to "love one another."

But the hate crimes continue and the Jazzicals begin to suspect each other. No one knows who to trust. Karina Kowalski and her substitute father, Officer Chuck Zander, step into the mire of suspicion and deceit to try to solve the mystery, and the Intermediates learn that they must be willing to pay a high price to bring love to a world filled with hate.

The White Rose Affair is the third novel in the Jazzicals series about synchronized skating, the world's fastest-growing ice skating sport.