"...parce que rien ne m'était familier."

In French, the subject comes before the verb. In this sentence, rien is the subject and is pulled in front of était.

Thank you, Chris!  That makes sense. :-)

'rien ne' means nothing - as a subject. ('personne ne' means no-one/nobody as a subject).  Personne ne ..., rien ne ... = No one, nothing (negation) in French