CHAPTER 14: “Of Beleriand and Its Realms” is pretty skippable too, you can just use this map.
I am re-reading The Silmarillion now. It’s written in a pretty similar style to TCoH and much of it takes place in the same era and involves the same people so I think you’d enjoy it.
Have you read Unfinished Tales yet? If not I’d put it on the list.
I thought Unfinished Tales was the same book as TCoH so I’ve never looked at it. I’ll put it on the list.
Unfinished Tales contains a slightly different version of the Children of Hurin but it makes up less than 20% of UT. The rest of UT is more of a recent backstory to LOTR than the older stories in the Silmarillion and The Children of Hurin. Other than TCoH it consists of shorter sections (some are 20 pages or less), that really fill in some of the holes in LOTR. It has sections on Numenor and how Sauron came to deceive the Numenorians and cause their downfall, the Palantir, information on Sauruman and how he came to occupy Isengard, the Rohirrim and their history, the early years of Gondor, etc. Next to LOTR itself, Unfinished Tales is one of my favorite Tolkien books, piecemeal though it may be.
I always heard that Patricia Cornwell was a good writer. I found her book about Jack the Ripper on a bus, brought it home and read it.
I was vastly overcharged.
I sure would like to go back 20 years ago and try to remember what it was that turned me off of The Silmarillion. I LOVE this book. Even Ainulindale and Valaquenta. It’s so exciting and interesting!
So glad I gave it another try. 
Bravo!! 
I consider Ainulindalë to be the best part!
Chapter 14 is still a bit of a slog for me, though. 