Update! I've just signed a deal with AuthorHouse - they published my first book - to publish the "prequel" under the title "Their Lordships Request..."
This book follows Harry, Ferghal and Danny Gunn as they grow and "come of age" on a voyage that takes them south to the Cape of Good Hope, then through the Great Southern Ocean and on to New South Wales. From there they visit Java, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and India. Harry is involved in a little diplomacy and Ferghal almost taken by slavers when they visit Muscat before turning for home and a date with a destiny described in "Out of Time".
As Harry and his friends mature and learn, so the Gunroom bully begins to lose his power over them and his dominance as the senior. In every sense leaders are sometimes born, but seldom made...
The book also introduces Harry's twelve times great nephew as he oversees the building of his new command, the star ship NECS Vanguard. In Harry's day the Government "Contractors" and civil servants robbed the navy by supplying rotting meat, green timber and poor quality goods at premium prices - the new Captain of the Vanguard must face similar scams, though they are now more subtle, as he stands by his new ship.
Both are headed for a convergence of their lives neither can forsee....