Literary fiiction v popular fiction in novel about Turkey

Elif Shafak's newest novel (she's written ten apparently), Three Daughters of Eve, has all the qualities to make it a best seller and possibly into a movie as well: dramatic opening sequence in which a professional-class woman driving thru an Istanbul traffic jam w/ recalcitrant teenage daughter runs off in pursuit of man who grabbed her handbag from unlocked rear seat and gives him a beat down then heads to social engagement among the city's nouveau riches and elites - then we flash back to her difficult childhood in the 1980s torn between traditional devout Islam mother and "modern" scientific rational father - and family upended by arrest of older brother for leftist views. We alternate between childhood scene Snead contemporary, thereby getting a broad picture of culture in turkey and how it has evolved in some ways as the nation becomes more prosperous (for some) and more western - a country torn historically between its two adjacent continents. We don't however get a sense (yet anyway) of current political oppression in Turkey - perhaps that will emerge; another facet of the novel just emerging ca p 100 is the woman's (Peri's) oxford education - which for some odd and improbable reason she has kept secret from her teenage daughter. This novel in no way feels as thoughtful, structurally imaginative, interior as those of say her contemporary O Pamuk, for betterment or worse; in other words this is popular rather than literary fiction - tho popular of a pretty high order and serious bent. Though the characters and events of the novel don't quite feel realistic, the setting, particularly I present day Istanbul does feel true to life i.e. The contrast between and juxtaposition of extreme wealth and poverty, the unbridled growth and concomitant congestion. Shafak acc to about the author note is Turkish but living in London and apparently she writes in English. Wondering how her boos if this one is typical are received in Istanbul as greatly insightful or as an outsider s view from afar,