 Utrio has been an academic in the Väinö Tanner Foundation since 2000.She was awarded the Finnish State Publication Prize in 2002 for her life's work, and Pro Finlandia medal in 1993.The majority of Utrio's novels are historicals, set in a vast array of periods from Antiquity to the early 19th century; however, her specialty has always been the medieval period and it's for her medieval novels that she's mostly known.