Her work on Gaelic influence in the Northumbrian Kingdom won the Frank Watson Book Prize in 2021 for "best book in Scottish history" over the previous two years, and was also shortlisted for the Saltire Society Literary Awards "Scottish History Book of the Year" in 2021.[5] At Lancaster she is professor in regional history and the director of the Regional Heritage Centre.[2]
Select publications
"Personal names and the cult of Patrick in eleventh-century Strathclyde and Northumbria", in Steven Boardman, John Reuben Davies and Eila Williamson (eds), Saints' Cults in the Celtic World (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2009), pp. 42-65.
Whithorn's renown in the early medieval period : Whithorn, 'Futerna' and 'magnum monasterium' (Whithorn : Friends of the Whithorn Trust, 2009)
(ed. with Paul Russell) Tome : studies in medieval Celtic history and law in honour of Thomas Charles-Edwards (Woodbridge, Suffolk : Boydell, 2011)
Gaelic influence in the Northumbrian Kingdom : the Golden Age and the Viking Age (Woodbridge : The Boydell Press, 2019)