The phrase "a sort of ill" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe a vague or non-specific type of illness or discomfort.
Example: "After eating that questionable food, I felt a sort of ill that I couldn't quite identify."
Alternatives: "a kind of sickness" or "a type of ailment".
Once or twice I was reminded of William Scott, or a sort of ill-tempered art informel painter.
He lambasts Mr Blair for failing to take seriously the challenge of public morality and for concentrating power within the executive, thus leaving the House of Commons "a sort of ill-tempered Hogwarts [Harry Potter's alma mater]".
Whether he was publicly comparing Barack Obama's primary victory in South Carolina to Jesse Jackson's campaigns in the eighties or privately, and apoplectically, complaining that Bill Richardson broke his word by endorsing Obama, every story has seemed to reinforce an image of Clinton as a sort of ill-tempered coot driven a little mad by Obama's success.
Not feeling a partner's love at this time of year can have all sorts of ill effects, particularly if a single woman doesn't have close friends or family.
Miéville describes the book, a riotous mixture of London lore, messianic cults and pop-cultural in-jokes, as "an attempt to channel a sort of hopefully enjoyable ill-disciplined exuberance that I felt I had been moving away from".
Yet rather than see it as a deliberate attempt by the religious to disguise faith in the clothes of pseudo-science, she argues that ID was a sort of desperate, if ill-conceived, response to a misreading of Darwinism disseminated by people like Dawkins.
The world was still very enchanted … the idea that the unicorn is a very strong animal and also that could achieve magical feats, so unicorn horn used to be seen as a panacea for all sorts of ills and a guard against poison.
Miss Leavitt comes across as a sort of wraith humourless and often ill, and rumoured to haunt the observatory after her death.
"The main thing was just – well, I think he was sort of ill all the time – but in between crises he was a lovely, lovely boy, but he was just – somehow no one could handle, no one could cope with him right from the word go, the playgroup…" Later she gives a tour of their photographs.
"Life as a House," a sort of "Mr. Neurotic-and-Fatally-Ill Builds His Dream House," gives Sam much to be nervous about.
Indeed, as Mr McGregor puts it, corruption has become a sort of "transaction tax that distributes ill-gotten gains among the ruling class…It becomes the glue that keeps the system together".
