"Unfinished Victory" was a book which Bryant had published in January 1940; it dealt with recent German history, and explained sympathetically how Germany had rebuilt herself after World War I. Bryant asserted that certain German Jews had benefited from the economic crises and controlled the national wealth, and although he criticised the destruction of Jewish shops and synagogues, he declared that the Third Reich might produce "a newer and happier Germany in the future". Initially most reviewers received the book positively, but after the 'phoney war' ended, public and elite opinion turned sharply against appeasement of any sort. Bryant realised his mistake in proposing a compromise and tried to buy up unsold copies.