My husband kept his under aged mistress prisoner in our coal cellar! Or Devil worshipping grandmother turns lesbian at 80! Pretty shocking hey? Well it is supposed to be! These stories attract huge payouts from tabloid magazines and newspapers so it is no wonder a lot of writers have turned their attention to this area of magazine writing.

Expect to be paid anything up to six thousand pounds and beyond for the right story, probably even more if it involves a high profile celeb. Add the prospect of a prominent byline then the attraction becomes even more alluring!

How hard is it then to break into this type of magazine writing? If you have something like a husband with a mistress in the coal cellar, pretty easy! Once word gets out, you will probably find buyers coming to you, but there are plenty of agencies and brokers who will be more than pleased to help you sell your story for a percentage of the fee.

These are usually journalists who know the industry inside out. They have excellent contacts and have a good command of payment rates so will know exactly what your story is worth.

The big snag is and it is a big one for anyone who is serious about launching a writing career is it is very unlikely that you will be doing any writing! Tabloid magazines and newspapers employ their own in house staff trained to milk each story for every drop of lurid, sensational tidbit.

For this reason you will be well advised to leave this area of magazine writing alone. A further warning should be given at this point. Should you decide to pursue this avenue, be prepared to have your story substantially altered even to the point where much of it is down right lies!

The good news is, you can earn a reasonably good living writing for magazines without having to paddle in these somewhat murky waters!

As long as your writing and research skills are of a reasonable level, there are plenty of magazines and websites offering good payment rates for articles.

Give yourself a good grounding in the basic skills of writing magazine articles and take on board the fact that writing is a business and you will soon begin to make sales.

You will find there is a lot of help available so do plenty of back ground reading on writing for magazinesbefore you start submitting your articles.

Get started by joining a good creative writing community. These very often carry market listings which pay for magazine articlesand are also a pillar of support for the emerging writer. You should also sign up for Mags & Rags, a superb ecourse on writing for magazines.This is currently free and will give you a good grounding in all aspects of magazine writing.