India, May 1 -- Stories from a Kargili Kitchen begins with a likening of the physical contours of the human body to the borders of the state: an analogy fitting for a people whose relationship with food can be conjectured as caused by, despite, or regardless of the conflicts that shaped the region. For the reader, it is hard not to experience anemoia-a longing for a land or time unknown-as author Yash Saxena, who was born in Jammu and Kashmir, carries on along a purposeful wander through the homes of Kargil, the joint capital of the Union Territory of Ladakh and a key site of combat during the 1999 India-Pakistan war. While determined to introduce the everyday Kargili to the greater India, Saxena does so rightly without overlooking the ro...