Hm.. I'm not sure about mentoring perse, but I can offer some advice and answer any questions you may have if that suffices.
As a general rule of thumb, recommendations on where to start will vary wildly depending on who you ask. I typically recommend [Python], as its easy to learn, powerful, versatile, and has lots of documentation and support. [Learn Python The Hard Way] can help familiarize you with the language, after that there are a number of API's you can move towards, such as [Pyglet] for graphics/audio/controllers/etc. among others. A few other places to check out would be [Tigsource] which is a community of independant developers, and [Gamasutra] which focuses more on the business and industry of game development.