Flashman is a 1969 novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 by George MacDonald Fraser

George MacDonald Fraser

George MacDonald Fraser, OBE was an English-born author of Scottish descent, who wrote both historical novels and non-fiction books, as well as several screenplays.-Early life and military career:...

. It is the first of the Flashman

Harry Paget Flashman

Sir Harry Paget Flashman VC KCB KCIE is a fictional character created by George MacDonald Fraser , but based on the character "Flashman" in Tom Brown's Schooldays , a semi-autobiographical work by Thomas Hughes ....

 novels.
Presented within the frame of the supposedly discovered historical Flashman Papers, this book describes the bully Flashman from Tom Brown's Schooldays

Tom Brown's Schooldays

Tom Brown's Schooldays is a novel by Thomas Hughes. The story is set at Rugby School, a public school for boys, in the 1830s; Hughes attended Rugby School from 1834 to 1842...

. The book begins with an explanatory note saying that the Flashman Papers were discovered in 1965 during a sale of household furniture in Ashby

Ashby-de-la-Zouch

Ashby-de-la-Zouch, — Zouch being pronounced "Zoosh" — often shortened to Ashby, is a small market town and civil parish in North West Leicestershire, England, within the National Forest. It is twinned with Pithiviers in north-central France....

, Leicestershire

Leicestershire

Leicestershire is a landlocked county in the English Midlands. It takes its name from the heavily populated City of Leicester, traditionally its administrative centre, although the City of Leicester unitary authority is today administered separately from the rest of Leicestershire...

. The papers are attributed to Harry Paget Flashman

Harry Paget Flashman

Sir Harry Paget Flashman VC KCB KCIE is a fictional character created by George MacDonald Fraser , but based on the character "Flashman" in Tom Brown's Schooldays , a semi-autobiographical work by Thomas Hughes ....

, who is not only the bully featured in Thomas Hughes

Thomas Hughes

Thomas Hughes was an English lawyer and author. He is most famous for his novel Tom Brown's Schooldays , a semi-autobiographical work set at Rugby School, which Hughes had attended. It had a lesser-known sequel, Tom Brown at Oxford .- Biography :Hughes was the second son of John Hughes, editor of...

' novel, but also a well known Victorian military hero (in Fraser's fictional England).