This book would actually be a good starting point for anyone who stumbles across the Prohaska series by John Biggins, as I did. It is chronologically first, tracing the career and life of Otto Prohaska from small-town Bohemia to the Imperial and Royal Navy of Austria-Hungary. Young Otto studies at the marine academy, learning 19th century sailing skills that will be largely irrelevant in the looming Great War. He travels around the world on a secret mission to find a missing Archduke, experiencing many adventures along the way.