I don't know if you answered this before, but how old was Olympias when she married Philip? I'm very interested on your view of her, It's very different than most authors. What asks/articles can I read to understand it better?
Olympias, Mother of Alexander the Great
Olympias was probably around 15 when she married Philip, and would probably have had Alexander at about 16, at most 17. That was a pretty standard age. Girls were traditionally betrothed after their first menses, and they seemed to start their menses later than we do now. In the case of Olympias, she was actually betrothed to Philip much younger, on the Isle of Samothrace during/after the initiations.
The deal would have been made between Philip's elder brother, King Perdikkas II and Olympias's uncle, who was regent for her younger brother, Alexandros. It would have been a backdoor deal between Macedon and Epiros against the power of Illyria under Bardylis. So contra the story in Plutarch, it was not a love match. 1) She was a little girl at the time, and 2) even if they'd hated each other on sight, the marriage would have been advantageous and gone through. (Beware of the "love matches" in the sources; they usually aren't.)
Driving around Epiros (see image below, 2nd is from Dodona), one gets a better sense of Olympias. It's rough country, compared to the lowlands. Families would have had to pull together there to survive, and the effort and work of women would have been required. The kingdom was not as absolute a kingship, and if the Molossian clan ruled, it was by consent of a council, who could remove kingship too. Alexander states at one point, observing when his mother and sister traded places, that his mother had made the smarter choice as the Macedonians wouldn't consent to be ruled by a woman. Apparently, the Epirotes would. And certainly Kleopatra had a great deal of power as regent for her son, when she was there. In this way, the Epirotes were perhaps closer to the Illyrians--also hill people, and among whom women could fight in combat.
In any case, Olympias would have been accustomed to more freedom and authority than she likely had in Pella. That may be one reason she clashed with Antipatros later, when he was regent, as well as with Philip occasionally. But clashes with Philip were exaggerated. They cooperated as much if not more than clashed, and any clashes were mostly as a result of offenses to the status of Alexander (or herself). In polygamous courts, the most important male in a wife's life wasn't the king but her son. If he didn't survive to take the throne, often she didn't either. So don't read Oedipal nonsense into that relationship. That's one reason I really disliked how Renault wrote Olympias, and how Stone directed Jolie to portray her in the movie (which is basically a direct steal from Renault).
Another important aspect for women in ancient Greece, Macedonia, Epiros, etc., was their role in religious rites. Olympias was a priestess, and Macedonia was rule by CLAN (the Argeads). So the women had specific roles to play, mostly in religion, but also in terms of dedications. We have information showing both Olympias and Kleopatra donating money to temples, etc., as did Philip's mother Eurydice...in her own name, not her husband's. And yes, that suggests some control over their finances, unlike women in Athens. I even put that in the novel; when Olympias interviews Kampaspe, she talks to her about a donation in Larissa, in the hopes of securing cavalry later for her son. That is precisely the sort of thing Macedonian royal women did.
I strongly recommend the work of Elizabeth Carney, if you want to know more about Olympias. Her biography is THE place to start. It's been out a while, so look for a used copy, or see if your local library has it, or can get it. Another article where Beth puts not a pin but a damn sword through the brutal image of Olympias in ancient sources is "Olympias and the Image of the Virago," Phoenix, 47.1 (1993): 29-55. The biography is a later work, but I point to that article as it really threw down the gauntlet to the (mostly male) Alexander scholars, about Olympias. As with the book, ask your local library to get a copy of the article for you via ILL (interlibrary loan).
It was Beth's work on Olympias that influenced how I portrayed her in the novels, even to using her other name, Myrtale, which I did to try to divorce her from ALL the horrible baggage. I did not want her to be a pushover--she manifestly wasn't--but all her actions have reasons, and reasons that aren't either jealousy or petulance. Even her objections to Hephaistion has nothing to do with jealousy of him and everything to do with what she considers a threat to Alexander's place as heir.
That's why I wrote "Two Scorpions," as one of the "outtakes" that occurs between the two novels, released between the publishing of book 1 and book 2. It's a confrontation between Hephaistion and Myrtale, and Hephaistion does not come out the winner, really.
In any case, I tried to make it clear that Myrtale is FAR from hated in the women's rooms. At one point, Alexander says his mother's women would die for her the same as his father's men would for him. And Myrtale is the only one to think of Kampaspe, when Alexander flees after the wedding. Hephaistion helps her, but because he almost falls over her when he goes to Alexander's room. Myrtale actually asks about her. Alexander more or less forgets her in all the hooplah. Myrtale doesn't.
I'll leave you with an interesting tribute to her. When the Greeks decided to build a trireme on the ancient model, back in the '80s, did they name it The Themistokles? Or The Perikles? No, they named her Olympias:
