In Brief: Madonna is the cash queen

Madonna has been named the highest-earning woman in pop, topping Forbes magazine's first-ever Cash Queens of Music List after she earned £36.2m between June 2006 and June 2007. Barbra Streisand came second with £30.1m while Celine Dion was ranked third, at £22.6m... Author JK Rowling has revealed that saying goodbye to Harry Potter was more painful than getting divorced, describing it as "the worst break-up of my life". Lord Attenborough presented Rowling with an 'outstanding achievement' award at the South Bank Show awards yesterday... The Duchess of York nearly burnt down her new country house in Surrey yesterday after leaving a scented candle alight in a toilet. Sarah Ferguson now faces a £20,000 bill for fire and smoke damage to bathroom furnishings... A conman posing as Heath Ledger's father Kim has reportedly talked John Travolta into buying him a plane ticket to the United States and had several conversations with Tom Cruise, who consoled him over the young actor's death before becoming suspicious... Hitler's 'death court' - the neo-baroque Third Reich courthouse where more than 1,000 anti-Nazi resistance fighters were sentenced to death - has been turned into a luxury development containing some of Berlin's most expensive flats... Francois Mitterand's collection of fedoras, slippers and other items of clothing and furniture has raised £111,000 for the former French President's widow's human rights foundation...