Linux mint is a great way to start. Most distros based on debian are. Their is a abundance of information and community support with these distros. Personally i Like OpenSuse but even though it is a amazing all round distro. It is more of a niche and their for i can not recommend it to a new user, intermediate i can absolutely recommend it.
About VMs Why not flip it around and use a Windows VM? personally I prefer it over dual booting if possible. no breaking boot loader when windows updates and you can snapshot windows which can come in handy. make a share between to 2 and you can move files from the VM to the host