Prize Stories 1996: The O. Henry Awards

Stephen King is the inexplicable winner of this year's prestigious O. Henry first prize, for a fair-to-middling psychological horror story, ''The Man in the Black Suit,'' in which a young boy goes fishing and meets the devil. Perhaps this was a dry year for American short-fiction writers? Clearly not, as the 19 other stories included in Prize Stories 1996: The O. Henry Awards are, overall, rich and eclectic. Works by big names include Jane Smiley's ''The Life of the Body,'' a strangely magnificent tale of a housewife who learns she is pregnant by her lover, and Alice Adams' humorous ''His Women,'' about a macho Citadel graduate who is nevertheless a cuckold. Writers to discover include Ralph Lombreglia (noted for that rare thing, a good and hilarious Internet love story) and Tom Paine (cited for an old-fashioned shipwreck tale with a brilliant political twist). In his final edition as the series' editor, 30-year veteran William Abrahams makes good on the reader-friendly promise that each story possess ''its own thumbprint — its own individual identity.'' A-