tl;dr Books, most likely generated by an LLM, were being sold on Amazon under Jane Friedman’s name. The same books were added to her Goodreads profile. Amazon initially refused to remove the books. If it’s happening to her, it’s definitely happening to other authors.
Because they have been around long enough that small niche businesses closed, and you can’t get what you need locally, so you go through Amazon or another website that wants to charge 20 bucks shipping on a 6 dollar item.